How to setup Groups and Alerts

The Group feature in the CheckPoint program is a powerful feature:

1. Specific users can interact with only their pertinent equipment based on the user login ID.
2. Users can be members in one or multiple groups
3. Equipment can be assigned to one or multiple groups
4. Alert Watch (pop up alert) can be triggered on a client computer only for a specified group
5. Email, pager or telephone alerts can be sent to different email groups based on day of the week and time of the day
6. Alerts can be escalated to any number of email groups
7. Unlimited number of groups can be created

Here are some tips and instructions to successfully create groups and configure alert escalations. 

1. Email group (Email\Groups)

    

   1. This group is ONLY for setting up the recipients for email. The recipient does not need to be a member of the user group. For example, a facilities engineer’s email can be included, but the engineer is not a member of the user’s group.
   2. The recipient address can be:

       

      1. Email address (john.smith@aol.com)
      2. Text message address (5101234567@myairmail.com)
      3. Telephone number (only if the server has a modem and connected to a telephone line)

          

   3. It is recommended to set up the email groups before setting up the alert escalation.
   4. It is recommended to use different names for email and user groups to avoid confusion.

       

2. User group (Settings\Groups(Email Escalation))

    

   1. This function allows users to interact only with the equipment assigned to the same group based on the users’ login ID.
   2. Set up the user list:

       

      1. Settings\User list, set up the user List. If groups are not yet set up, the user can be assigned to the global group, and then changed later when you edit the group.

          

   3. Set up user Groups:

       

      1. Settings\Groups, ADD a group name.

1.  
   1. Move users of this group to the member’s column.
   2. Move equipment for this group into the assigned column.
   3. Hint: To move multiple equipment items at the same time, hold Ctrl button and left click to highlight equipment, and then move.

1.  
   1.  
      1. You can include the same equipment in multiple groups.

          

         1. This allows users in different groups to view common equipment.

             

      2. You can include the same user as a member in multiple groups.

          

         1. This allows the user to interact with the equipment in all the groups that the user is a member.
         2. If a user is a member of multiple groups, the user’s ID will appear in the User Login History for each group.

             

      3. It is recommended not to delete the default “global” group

          

         1. A supervisor who oversees all the groups can be a member of this global group without having to be a member of every group.
         2. The supervisor’s ID will appear in User Login History only for the global group
         3. Do not set up an Email Escalation for the global group (reason explained in Alert Escalation below).

             

2. Alert Escalation

    

   1. There are 3 methods to set up an alert escalation path

       

      1. While adding or editing a group, you can set the same path for the entire group.
      2. Email\Escalation Settings\Equipment. This allows you to set a path for individual equipment.
      3. Settings\Equipment, hover curser over the equipment row, right click, then Edit Email Escalation. This allows you to set the path for individual equipment.

          

   2. The first method is recommended

       

      1. While adding or editing a group, click on the blue “Edit Email Escalation”
      2. If one or more equipment already has an escalation path, a message will appear showing which equipment has the conflict.

          

         1. Return to the Groups in System page, and highlight the conflicting equipment on the drop down menu.
         2. The group(s) that this same equipment is assigned will appear in the upper box.
         3. Edit and un-assign the equipment so that it will be only in one group.
         4. It is possible to allow multiple group users to view common equipment, and yet have an escalation path, by creating a “common” group.

             

            1. Un-assign the “common” equipment from the various groups.
            2. Create a new “shared (or common)” group, and assign all the users and the common equipment to this new group.
            3. Create an escalation path for this group.

                

            Set up the email escalation for each group

            1. Follow instructions as explained on the page.
            2. The first email will be sent to the first selected email group immediately when the alert time threshold is met, as set up in Settings\Equipment for the individual equipment.
            3. The second and subsequent emails will be sent after the selected wait time.
            4. Alerts to any combination of Email, text message or phone numbers in the email groups can be sent.
            5. The same recipient(s) can receive the alerts multiple times by creating new email groups with the same recipient(s).

                

3. Alert Watch

    

   1. Alert Watch is a pop up that automatically appears on screen if an equipment is in an alert state
   2. To restrict the pop up only to the equipment in a group

       

      1.  
         1. In Groups in the System, highlight the desired group
         2. Click AlertWatch.
         3. Repeat this on each client computer.
         4. Note: You must be a Windows Administrator to enable this function.  Although a successful message will appear, the function is not enabled if you are not logged in as Windows admin.

             

   3. The Alert Watch will continue to pop up on all the client computers until any user clears the pop up by clicking OK.

       

      1.  
         1. If the first user clears the pop up, then it will not appear on subsequent computers.