PI Notifications Uses Microsoft Lync to Alert the Right People in Real-Time, Turning Streams

PI Notifications uses Microsoft Lync toalert the right people in real-time, turning streams of data into actionable information.

The OSIsoft PI System isthe leading enterprise infrastructure for management of real-time data and events. It handles operational data with high performanceand transforms the data into actionable information. The solution includes PI Notifications, a real-time event notification system that uses Microsoft Lync to eliminate delays in getting the right people notified. As a result, users are able to keep their operations running smoothly.

Business Needs

Increasingly, businessesmust do more with fewer people. A company’s operations can generate thousands or even millions of important points of data every day. Manually monitoring this data to detect significant events is impractical and often impossible. Also, important events can happen at any time, making it critical to alert the right people wherever they are.

Solution

OSIsoft PI Notifications monitors for critical events so users don’t have to. Alerts are sent to the right people wherever they are so they can act. The notifications do not simply tell usersthere is a problem; contextual information can be included with the notification to assist with finding the root cause. And with additional support for intelligent escalation, the solution ensures that events are acted upon.

Powerful Notification Rules

Users create their own rules to define an event and trigger a notification. Rules can be created using simple comparisons, Statistical Quality Control pattern tests, or user-defined equations. PI Notifications can also employ more complex logic usingPI ACE and PI for StreamInsight.

Actionable Information Notification content is fully customizable and includes a variety of information: data values, hyperlinks, files, and links to a PI WebParts trend. Users are not simply notified; they are given the information they need to investigate and respond quickly.

Notification Escalation

An escalation hierarchy can be configured for groups of recipients. If an alert is not acknowledged, another notification is sent to the next recipient(s) in the escalation hierarchy. This process can be repeated until the alert is acknowledged.

Active Directory Integration

Because of the solution’s integration with a company’s existing IT infrastructure, recipients can be selected directly from the Active Directory service and the Microsoft Lync 2010 contact list.

Benefits

Intelligent Monitoring

PI Notifications rules are created using easy-to-understand configuration, not coding. Users can control the implementation of their own business needs.

Extensible Delivery

Today’s workers are increasingly mobile, and alerts must reach the right people wherever they are. PI Notifications can be sent via email, Lync 2010 instant messages, and desktop pop-up windows. Customers can create custom delivery channels to extend notification options to other systems.

Valuable Insights

When and why critical events occur and how they were solved is important and valuable information. PI Notifications stores information about notifications including comments and who acknowledged the alert. This captured insight is then available for forensics, auditing, and use in future analysis.

Escalation Management

Critical events need to be acted upon. With PI Notifications, alerts can be escalated throughout anorganization until action is taken.

On-Demand Visualization Valuable time can be lost while people try to find information. With PI Notifications, information comes to the user.Alerts can include relevant data and links to help quickly investigate the issue. Alerts can easily link to other OSIsoft visualization products including PI ProcessBook, PI WebParts, and PI DataLink an add-in for Microsoft Excel.

Excursion Auditing
PI Notifications records the alert history, acknowledgement, and user-entered comments to support electronic reporting requirements.

Notification Management

To simplify the implementation of alerts, notification templates can be defined for assets. Notifications will then be automatically configured when new assets are created.