> The new history as well as the clock in the web page header show the local time 
> of the user's computer running the browser.
> Would it be possible to make it either always use the time zone of the Midas 
> server, or make it selectable from the config page?
> It's not ideal trying to relate error messages from the midas.log to history 
> plots if the time stamps don't match.

I implemented a new row in the config page to select the time zone. 

"Local": Time zone where the browser runs
"Server": Time zone where the midas server runs (you have to update mhttpd for that)
"UTC+X": Any other time zone

The setting affects both the status header and the history display.

I spent quite some time with "named" time zones like "PST" "EST" "CEST", but the 
support for that is not that great in JavaScript, so I decided to go with simple 
UTC+X. Hope that's ok.

Please give it a try and let me know if it's working for you.

Best,
Stefan

I found a way to embed modbvalue into a SVG:

<text x="100" y="100" font-size="30rem">
Run=<tspan class="modbvalue" data-odb-path="/Runinfo/Run number"></tspan>
</text>

This seems to behave better that the suggestion below.

> You can't really embed it, but you can overlay it. You tag the SVG with a 
> "relative" position and then move the modbvalue with an "absolute" position over 
> it:
> 
> <svg style="position:relative" width="400" height="100">
>   <rect width="300" height="100" style="fill:rgb(255,0,0);stroke-width:3;stroke:rgb(0,0,0)" />
>   <div class="modbvalue" style="position:absolute;top:50px;left:50px" data-odb-path="/Runinfo/Run number"></div>
> </svg>

> > The new history as well as the clock in the web page header show the local time 
> > of the user's computer running the browser.
> > Would it be possible to make it either always use the time zone of the Midas 
> > server, or make it selectable from the config page?
> > It's not ideal trying to relate error messages from the midas.log to history 
> > plots if the time stamps don't match.
> 
> I implemented a new row in the config page to select the time zone. 
> 
> "Local": Time zone where the browser runs
> "Server": Time zone where the midas server runs (you have to update mhttpd for that)
> "UTC+X": Any other time zone
> 
> The setting affects both the status header and the history display.
> 
> I spent quite some time with "named" time zones like "PST" "EST" "CEST", but the 
> support for that is not that great in JavaScript, so I decided to go with simple 
> UTC+X. Hope that's ok.
> 
> Please give it a try and let me know if it's working for you.
> 
> Best,
> Stefan

Hi Stefan,

This is great, the UTC+x is perfect, thank you.
PAA

Dear all,
      I'm trying to use the logging on a mysql DB. Following the instructions on 
the Wiki, I recompiled MIDAS after installing mysql, and cmake with NEED_MYSQL=1 
can find it:

-- MIDAS: Found MySQL version 8.0.23

Then, I compiled my frontend (cmake with no options + make) and run it, but in the 
ODB I cannot find the tree for mySQL. I have only:

Logger/Runlog/ASCII

while I would expect also:

Logger/Runlog/SQL

What could be missing? Maybe should I add something in the CMakeList file or run 
cmake with some option?

Thank you,
      Francesco

I solved this, it was a failed "make clean" before recompiling. Now it works.

Sorry for the noise.

Francesco

> Dear all,
>       I'm trying to use the logging on a mysql DB. Following the instructions on 
> the Wiki, I recompiled MIDAS after installing mysql, and cmake with NEED_MYSQL=1 
> can find it:
> 
> -- MIDAS: Found MySQL version 8.0.23
> 
> Then, I compiled my frontend (cmake with no options + make) and run it, but in the 
> ODB I cannot find the tree for mySQL. I have only:
> 
> Logger/Runlog/ASCII
> 
> while I would expect also:
> 
> Logger/Runlog/SQL
> 
> What could be missing? Maybe should I add something in the CMakeList file or run 
> cmake with some option?
> 
> Thank you,
>       Francesco

There have been times in ALPHA that an alarm is triggered and the shift crew 
are unclear who to contact if they aren't trained to fix the specific 
failure mode.

I wish to add the property 'Users responsible' to the ODB for Alarms and 
Programs.

I have drafted what this might look like in a new pull request:
https://bitbucket.org/tmidas/midas/pull-requests/22/add-users-responsible-
field-for-specific

It requires changing of several data structures, I think I have found all 
instances of the definitions so the ODB should 'repair' any of the old 
structures adding in users responsible.

If 'Users responsible' is set, MIDAS messages append them after the message 
in brackets '()'. If used in conjunction with the MIDAS messenger 
(mmessenger), the users responsible can be 'tagged' directly.

I.e, for slack, simply set the 'users responsible' to <@UserID|Nickname>, 
for mattermost '@username', for discord '<@userid>'. Note that discord 
doesn't allow you to tag by username, but numeric userid



I have expanded char array in 'al_trigger_class' to handle the potentially 
longer MIDAS messages. Perhaps since I'm touching these lines I should 
change these temporary containers to std::string (line 383 and 386 of 
alarm.cxx)?

I have tested this quite a bit for my system, I am not sure how I can test 
mjsonrpc.

I think this is a good idea and I support it. We have a similar problem in MEG and 
we solved that with external (bash) scripts called in case of alarms. One feature 
there we have is that for some alarms, several people want to get notified. So 
people can "subscribe" to certain alarms. The subscription are now handled inside 
Slack which I like better, but maybe it would be good to have more than one "user 
responsible". Like if one person is sleeping/traveling, it's good to have a 
substitute. Can you make an array out of that? Or a comma-separated list?

Best,
Stefan

> I think this is a good idea and I support it. We have a similar problem in MEG and 
> we solved that with external (bash) scripts called in case of alarms. One feature 
> there we have is that for some alarms, several people want to get notified. So 
> people can "subscribe" to certain alarms. The subscription are now handled inside 
> Slack which I like better, but maybe it would be good to have more than one "user 
> responsible". Like if one person is sleeping/traveling, it's good to have a 
> substitute. Can you make an array out of that? Or a comma-separated list?
> 
> Best,
> Stefan

Presently there are 256 characters in the 'users responsible' field, so you can just 
list many users (no space, space or comma whatever). Discord, slack and mattermost 
don't care, they just parse the user tags.

I can still make this an array and pass a std::vector<std::string> into 
al_trigger_class function?

> I can still make this an array and pass a std::vector<std::string> into 
> al_trigger_class function?

Maybe 256 chars are enough at the moment. If other people complain in the future, we can 
re-visit.

Stefan

> > I can still make this an array and pass a std::vector<std::string> into 
> > al_trigger_class function?
> 
> Maybe 256 chars are enough at the moment. If other people complain in the future, we can 
> re-visit.
> 
> Stefan

Thinking about it, an array of maybe 80 character would give enough space for a name, a tag 
and phone number. Do I need to budget memory very strictly? Would 32 entries of 80 
characters be too much? 

> > > I can still make this an array and pass a std::vector<std::string> into 
> > > al_trigger_class function?
> > 
> > Maybe 256 chars are enough at the moment. If other people complain in the future, we can 
> > re-visit.
> > 
> > Stefan
> 
> Thinking about it, an array of maybe 80 character would give enough space for a name, a tag 
> and phone number. Do I need to budget memory very strictly? Would 32 entries of 80 
> characters be too much? 

On that level memory is cheap.

Stefan

I've updated the branch / pull request to use an array of 10 entries (80 chars each). 32 felt a 
little overkill when I saw it on screen, but absolutely happy to set it to any number you 
recommend.

The array gets flattened out when an alarm is triggered, currently the formatting produces

AlarmClass : AlarmMessage (Flattened List Of Users Responsible Array With Space Separators)

If experiments want to use Discord / Slack / Mattermost tags and or add phone numbers, that 
should fit in 80 characters

This list of responsible being attached to alarm message strings will be great for the 
mmessenger, however, perhaps its going to generate very long messages for the speaker programs 
(web interface and mlxspeaker ):

AlarmClass : AlarmMessage (ResponsibleUser1 ResponsibleUser2 ResponsibleUser3 ResponsibleUser4 
... ResponsibleUser4)

especially if people put in user tags or emergency contact details...

Should we add a key word or character for the programs that create audio to parse that silence 
the list of responsible users? I'd be tempted to use a single character but there is a risk 
users might have that in a custom alarm message. Maybe something usual like the 'bel' 
character? '|'? 

Perhaps use the string 'Responsible:' or 'Users:' to trim out the Users Responsible list from 
the message string?

AlarmClass : AlarmMessage Responsible:(ResponsibleUser1 ResponsibleUser2 ResponsibleUser3 
ResponsibleUser4 ... ResponsibleUser4)

AlarmClass : AlarmMessage Users:(ResponsibleUser1 ResponsibleUser2 ResponsibleUser3 
ResponsibleUser4 ... ResponsibleUser4)

> This list of responsible being attached to alarm message strings ...

This is a great idea. But I think we do not need to artificially limit ourselves
to string and array lengths.

The code in alarm.c should be changes to use std::string and std::vector<std::string> (STRING_LIST 
#define), db_get_record() should be replaced with individual ODB reads (that's what it does behind 
the scenes, but in a non-type and -size safe way).

I think the web page code will work correctly, it does not care about string lengths.

K.O.

> > This list of responsible being attached to alarm message strings ...
> 
> This is a great idea. But I think we do not need to artificially limit ourselves
> to string and array lengths.
> 
> The code in alarm.c should be changes to use std::string and std::vector<std::string> (STRING_LIST 
> #define), db_get_record() should be replaced with individual ODB reads (that's what it does behind 
> the scenes, but in a non-type and -size safe way).
> 
> I think the web page code will work correctly, it does not care about string lengths.
> 
> K.O.

Ok, I'm working on this... I see a design choice to make, 1. Keep 'ALARM' as a struct, or 2. Replace ALARM struct with a class (keeping memory layout the same). Since we are adding STRING_LIST, I'd lean towards a C++ style with a class

1. Keep 'ALARM' as a struct:
Get rid of ALARM_ODB_STR for the default values
Add static functions (that take a hkey) to interact with the ODB (to save duplicating logic in al_reset_alarm, al_check, al_define_odb_alarm and al_trigger_alarm)

2. Replace ALARM struct with a class:
default ctor: Do nothing special (so it behaves like the old struct)
default dtor: std::vector<std::string> dtor will

It seems an opportunity to convert the alarm struct to a class with member functions that take hkey pointers?

default ctor: Do nothing special (so it behaves like the old struct)
default dtor: std::vector<std::string> dtor will
SetToDefault: This is where default values are hard coded (functionally replace ALARM_ODB_STR )

> > This list of responsible being attached to alarm message strings ...
> 
> This is a great idea. But I think we do not need to artificially limit ourselves
> to string and array lengths.
> 
> The code in alarm.c should be changes to use std::string and std::vector<std::string> (STRING_LIST 
> #define), db_get_record() should be replaced with individual ODB reads (that's what it does behind 
> the scenes, but in a non-type and -size safe way).
> 
> I think the web page code will work correctly, it does not care about string lengths.
> 
> K.O.

Auto growing lists is an excellent plan. I am making decent progress and should have something to 
report soon

> > > This list of responsible being attached to alarm message strings ...
> > 
> > This is a great idea. But I think we do not need to artificially limit ourselves
> > to string and array lengths.
> > 
> > The code in alarm.c should be changes to use std::string and std::vector<std::string> (STRING_LIST 
> > #define), db_get_record() should be replaced with individual ODB reads (that's what it does behind 
> > the scenes, but in a non-type and -size safe way).
> > 
> > I think the web page code will work correctly, it does not care about string lengths.
> > 
> > K.O.
> 
> Auto growing lists is an excellent plan. I am making decent progress and should have something to 
> report soon

This has sent me down a little rabbit hole, and I'd like to check in with efforts to improve the efficiency and simplicity of the alarm code.

I can keep with the current 'C' style of the alarm.cxx code, replace struct read and writes to the odb with individual odb entries... put functions in alarm.cxx to create, read and write to the odb... 

If we go this 'C' style route, then I'll have duplication of the 'users responsible' setters and getter functions for structs ALARM and PROGRAM_INFO

What would the MIDAS developers thing of creating classes for ALARM and PROGRAM_INFO (I am thinking for binary compatibilities of not touching ALARM and PROGRAM_INFO structs, and inheriting from them:

class UsersResponsible
{
   public:
      STRING_LIST fUsersResponsible;
}

class Alarm: public ALARM, public UsersResponsible
{
}

class ProgramInfo: public PROGRAM_INFO, public UsersResponsible
{
}

Each of these three classes would have member to functions to Create, Read and Write to the ODB. We could get rid of the PROGRAM_INFO_STR precompiler macro and instead have a SetToDefault member function. 

It seems clear we should set the ODB path in the constructor of Alarm and ProgramInfo

I agree that those two things are problems, but I don't see why it is preferable to leave the MidasConfig.cmake in this "broken" state. For us 
problem 1 is less of an issue, becaues we run "link_directories(${MIDAS_LIBRARY_DIRS})" in the top CMakeLists.txt and then just link against "midas", 
not "${MIDAS_LIBRARIES}". However, number 2 would be nice, to not manually hack in target_include_directories(target ${MIDASSYS}/mscb/include), 
especially because ${MIDASSYS} is not set in cmake. 

I see two solutions for problem 2: Treat mscb as a submodule and compile and install it together with midas, or add the include directory to 
${MIDAS_INCLUDE_DIRS} (same applies to the other submodules, mscb is the one that made me open this elog just now)

Cheers
Lukas
 
> > find_package(Midas)
> 
> I am testing find_package(Midas). There is a number of problems:
> 
> 1) ${MIDAS_LIBRARIES} is set to "midas;midas-shared;midas-c-compat;mfe".
> 
> This seem to be an incomplete list of all libraries build by midas (rmana is missing).
> 
> This means ${MIDAS_LIBRARIES} should not be used for linking midas programs (unlike ${ROOT_LIBRARIES}, etc):
> 
> - we discourage use of midas shared library because it always leads to problems with shared library version mismatch (static linking is preferred)
> - midas-c-compat is for building python interfaces, not for linking midas programs
> - mfe contains a main() function, it will collide with the user main() function
> 
> So I think this should be changed to just "midas" and midas linking dependancy
> libraries (-lutil, -lrt, -lpthread) should also be added to this list.
> 
> Of course the "install(EXPORT)" method does all this automatically. (so my fixing find_package(Midas) is a waste of time)
> 
> 2) ${MIDAS_INCLUDE_DIRS} is missing the mxml, mjson, mvodb, midasio submodule directories
> 
> Again, install(EXPORT) handles all this automatically, in find_package(Midas) it has to be done by hand.
> 
> Anyhow, this is easy to add, but it does me no good in the rootana cmake if I want to build against old versions
> of midas. So in the rootana cmake, I still have to add $MIDASSYS/mvodb & co by hand. Messy.
> 
> I do not know the history of cmake and why they have two ways of doing things (find_package and install(EXPORT)),
> this second method seems to be much simpler, everything is exported automatically into one file,
> and it is much easier to use (include the export file and say target_link_libraries(rootana PUBLIC midas)).
> 
> So how much time should I spend in fixing find_package(Midas) to make it generally usable?
> 
> - include path is incomplete
> - library list is nonsense
> - compiler flags are not exported (we do not need -DOS_LINUX, but we do need -DHAVE_ZLIB, etc)
> - dependency libraries are not exported (-lz, -lutil, -lrt, -lpthread, etc)
> 
> K.O.

> I agree that those two things are problems, but I don't see why it is preferable to leave the MidasConfig.cmake in this "broken" state. For us 
> problem 1 is less of an issue, becaues we run "link_directories(${MIDAS_LIBRARY_DIRS})" in the top CMakeLists.txt and then just link against "midas", 
> not "${MIDAS_LIBRARIES}". However, number 2 would be nice, to not manually hack in target_include_directories(target ${MIDASSYS}/mscb/include), 
> especially because ${MIDASSYS} is not set in cmake.

So you say "nuke ${MIDAS_LIBRARIES}" and "fix ${MIDAS_INCLUDE}". Ok.

Problem still remains with required auxiliary libraries for linking "-lmidas". Sometimes you
need "-lutil" and "-lrt" and "-lpthread", sometimes not. Some way to pass this information
automatically would be nice.

Problem still remains that I cannot do these changes because I have no test harness
for any of this. Would be great if you could contribute this and post the documentation
blurb that we can paste into the midas wiki documentation.

And I still do not understand why we have to do all this work when cmake "import(EXPORT)"
already does all of this automatically. What am I missing?

K.O.

> 
> I see two solutions for problem 2: Treat mscb as a submodule and compile and install it together with midas, or add the include directory to 
> ${MIDAS_INCLUDE_DIRS} (same applies to the other submodules, mscb is the one that made me open this elog just now)
> 
> Cheers
> Lukas
>  
> > > find_package(Midas)
> > 
> > I am testing find_package(Midas). There is a number of problems:
> > 
> > 1) ${MIDAS_LIBRARIES} is set to "midas;midas-shared;midas-c-compat;mfe".
> > 
> > This seem to be an incomplete list of all libraries build by midas (rmana is missing).
> > 
> > This means ${MIDAS_LIBRARIES} should not be used for linking midas programs (unlike ${ROOT_LIBRARIES}, etc):
> > 
> > - we discourage use of midas shared library because it always leads to problems with shared library version mismatch (static linking is preferred)
> > - midas-c-compat is for building python interfaces, not for linking midas programs
> > - mfe contains a main() function, it will collide with the user main() function
> > 
> > So I think this should be changed to just "midas" and midas linking dependancy
> > libraries (-lutil, -lrt, -lpthread) should also be added to this list.
> > 
> > Of course the "install(EXPORT)" method does all this automatically. (so my fixing find_package(Midas) is a waste of time)
> > 
> > 2) ${MIDAS_INCLUDE_DIRS} is missing the mxml, mjson, mvodb, midasio submodule directories
> > 
> > Again, install(EXPORT) handles all this automatically, in find_package(Midas) it has to be done by hand.
> > 
> > Anyhow, this is easy to add, but it does me no good in the rootana cmake if I want to build against old versions
> > of midas. So in the rootana cmake, I still have to add $MIDASSYS/mvodb & co by hand. Messy.
> > 
> > I do not know the history of cmake and why they have two ways of doing things (find_package and install(EXPORT)),
> > this second method seems to be much simpler, everything is exported automatically into one file,
> > and it is much easier to use (include the export file and say target_link_libraries(rootana PUBLIC midas)).
> > 
> > So how much time should I spend in fixing find_package(Midas) to make it generally usable?
> > 
> > - include path is incomplete
> > - library list is nonsense
> > - compiler flags are not exported (we do not need -DOS_LINUX, but we do need -DHAVE_ZLIB, etc)
> > - dependency libraries are not exported (-lz, -lutil, -lrt, -lpthread, etc)
> > 
> > K.O.

> So you say "nuke ${MIDAS_LIBRARIES}" and "fix ${MIDAS_INCLUDE}". Ok.

A more moderate option would be to remove mfe from ${MIDAS_LIBRARIES}, but as far as I understand mfe is not the only problem, so nuking might be the 
better option after all. In addition, setting ${MIDASSYS} in MidasConfig.cmake would probably improve compatibility.

>Sometimes you need "-lutil" and "-lrt" and "-lpthread", sometimes not. 
>Some way to pass this information automatically would be nice.

I do not properly understand when you need this and when not, but can't this be communicated with the PUBLIC keyword of target_link_libraries()? If I 
understand if we can use PUBLIC for -lutil, -lrt and -lpthread, I can write something, test it here and create a pull request.

> And I still do not understand why we have to do all this work when cmake "import(EXPORT)"
> already does all of this automatically. What am I missing?

Does this not require midas to be built every time you import it? I know, it's a bit the "billions of flies can't be wrong" argument, but I've never seen 
any package that uses import(EXPORT) over find_package().

> > I agree that those two things are problems, but I don't see why it is preferable to leave the MidasConfig.cmake in this "broken" state. For us 
> > problem 1 is less of an issue, becaues we run "link_directories(${MIDAS_LIBRARY_DIRS})" in the top CMakeLists.txt and then just link against "midas", 
> > not "${MIDAS_LIBRARIES}". However, number 2 would be nice, to not manually hack in target_include_directories(target ${MIDASSYS}/mscb/include), 
> > especially because ${MIDASSYS} is not set in cmake.
> 
> So you say "nuke ${MIDAS_LIBRARIES}" and "fix ${MIDAS_INCLUDE}". Ok.
> 
> Problem still remains with required auxiliary libraries for linking "-lmidas". Sometimes you
> need "-lutil" and "-lrt" and "-lpthread", sometimes not. Some way to pass this information
> automatically would be nice.
> 
> Problem still remains that I cannot do these changes because I have no test harness
> for any of this. Would be great if you could contribute this and post the documentation
> blurb that we can paste into the midas wiki documentation.
> 
> And I still do not understand why we have to do all this work when cmake "import(EXPORT)"
> already does all of this automatically. What am I missing?
> 
> K.O.
> 
> > 
> > I see two solutions for problem 2: Treat mscb as a submodule and compile and install it together with midas, or add the include directory to 
> > ${MIDAS_INCLUDE_DIRS} (same applies to the other submodules, mscb is the one that made me open this elog just now)
> > 
> > Cheers
> > Lukas
> >  
> > > > find_package(Midas)
> > > 
> > > I am testing find_package(Midas). There is a number of problems:
> > > 
> > > 1) ${MIDAS_LIBRARIES} is set to "midas;midas-shared;midas-c-compat;mfe".
> > > 
> > > This seem to be an incomplete list of all libraries build by midas (rmana is missing).
> > > 
> > > This means ${MIDAS_LIBRARIES} should not be used for linking midas programs (unlike ${ROOT_LIBRARIES}, etc):
> > > 
> > > - we discourage use of midas shared library because it always leads to problems with shared library version mismatch (static linking is preferred)
> > > - midas-c-compat is for building python interfaces, not for linking midas programs
> > > - mfe contains a main() function, it will collide with the user main() function
> > > 
> > > So I think this should be changed to just "midas" and midas linking dependancy
> > > libraries (-lutil, -lrt, -lpthread) should also be added to this list.
> > > 
> > > Of course the "install(EXPORT)" method does all this automatically. (so my fixing find_package(Midas) is a waste of time)
> > > 
> > > 2) ${MIDAS_INCLUDE_DIRS} is missing the mxml, mjson, mvodb, midasio submodule directories
> > > 
> > > Again, install(EXPORT) handles all this automatically, in find_package(Midas) it has to be done by hand.
> > > 
> > > Anyhow, this is easy to add, but it does me no good in the rootana cmake if I want to build against old versions
> > > of midas. So in the rootana cmake, I still have to add $MIDASSYS/mvodb & co by hand. Messy.
> > > 
> > > I do not know the history of cmake and why they have two ways of doing things (find_package and install(EXPORT)),
> > > this second method seems to be much simpler, everything is exported automatically into one file,
> > > and it is much easier to use (include the export file and say target_link_libraries(rootana PUBLIC midas)).
> > > 
> > > So how much time should I spend in fixing find_package(Midas) to make it generally usable?
> > > 
> > > - include path is incomplete
> > > - library list is nonsense
> > > - compiler flags are not exported (we do not need -DOS_LINUX, but we do need -DHAVE_ZLIB, etc)
> > > - dependency libraries are not exported (-lz, -lutil, -lrt, -lpthread, etc)
> > > 
> > > K.O.