About this task
When Proficy Historian backs up alarms, it creates a copy of the alarm data in an offline file that can be restored later. The alarms are not removed from the online system. You can backup alarms using the Historian Administrator or through a command line program.
For more information on the command line program, refer to Using ihBackupAlarms.exe to Backup Alarms from the Command Line.
To backup alarms using the Historian Administrator pointing at a 6.0 or newer archiver:
Procedure
- Open the Alarms Maintenance screen. In the Backup/Purge Alarms section, set the time range. Setting the time range helps you back up alarms within a time range.
- In the Start Time field, select the start date using the drop-down arrow. Optionally, click the element you want to change and enter the details.
Select the start time using the up and down arrow keys in the field.
- In the End Time field, select the end date using the drop-down arrow. Optionally, click the element you want to change and enter the details.
Select the end time using the up and down arrow keys in the combo box.
- Click Backup Alarms. In the Save As dialog that appears, the file name of the alarm backup is displayed.
The file format is as follows: mm-dd-yyyy hh:mm:ss. The time format followed is the 24-hour time notation. For example, if the file name is 7-13-2013 16-29-24 it means that the archive was saved on July 13, 2013 at 4 hours, 29 minutes, and 24 seconds. This file naming convention for alarm backup is standard to Historian. Even if you use other date settings such as dd-mm, the file name will still be saved in the mm-dd format.
The end time stamp in the file name indicates the time at which the alarms have been backed up but not the time till when the alarms are backed up. For example, if you do a backup at 8:00 A.M. using a time of now-2 hours, the backup will contain alarms from 6:00 A.M to 8:00 A.M. but may not contain an alarm at 8:00 A.M. The last alarm may have been at 7:50 A.M. But the backup file name will have the time stamp of 8:00:00 along with the date.
- Click Save.
A status message with the backup progress appears. If the backup has been successful, a message appears indicating the same.
Note:
- The backup is saved as a .zip file, by default.
- The file is saved in the backup path mentioned while saving the file.
- If your SQL Server is on a different computer, ensure that you specify a path available to the SQL Server.
- If you want to migrate data from an Alarms and Events server that is earlier than 8.1, before backing up the data, you must apply the AEBackupEB package on the Alarms and Events database. You can find the AEBackupEB package on Salesforce. However, if you have already backed up the data, restore the data, apply the AEBackupEB package, and back up the data again.