Rules and events

Rules are a central element in your system. Rules determine highly important settings, such as when cameras should record, when PTZ cameras should patrol, when notifications should be sent, etc.

Example - a rule specifying that a particular camera should begin recording when it detects motion:

Events are central elements when using the Manage Rule wizard. In the wizard, events are primarily used for triggering actions. For example, you can create a rule which specifies that in the event of detected motion, the surveillance system should take the action of starting recording of video from a particular camera.

The following types of conditions can trigger rules:

Name	Description
Events	When events occur on the surveillance system, for example when motion is detected or the system receives input from external sensors.
Time interval	When you enter specific periods of time, for example: Thursday 16th August 2007 from 07.00 to 07.59 or every Saturday and Sunday
Failover time interval	Periods of time where failover is active or inactive.
Recurring time	When you set an action to be executed on a detailed, recurring schedule. For example: Every week on Tuesday every 1 hour(s) between 15:00 and 15:30 On day 15 every 3 month(s) at 11:45 Every day every 1 hour(s) between 15:00 and 19:00 The time is based on the local time settings of the server on which Management Client is installed.

You can work with the following under Rules and Events:

• Rules: Rules are a central element in the system. The behavior of your surveillance system is to a very large extent determined by rules. When creating a rule, you can work with all types of events
• Time profiles: Time profiles are periods of time defined in the Management Client. You use them when you create rules in the Management Client, for example to create a rule which specifies that a certain action should take place within a certain time profile
• Notification profiles: You can use notification profiles to set up ready-made email notifications, which can automatically be triggered by a rule, for example when a particular event occurs
• User-defined events: User-defined events are custom-made events that makes it possible for users to manually trigger events in the system or react to inputs from the system
• Analytics events: Analytics events are data received from external third-party video content analysis (VCA) providers. You can use analytics events as basis for alarms
• Generic events: Generic events allow you to trigger actions in the XProtect event server by sending simple strings via the IP network to your system