Sentinel Release 4.11

P2 Sentinel 4.11 includes improved handling of data returned from datasources as 'bad', creation of Time Windows, and adds Azure authentication.

Sentinel version 4.11 adds:

  • Improved handling of data marked as ‘bad’ by the Historian or other datasource
  • The ability to create Time Windows that are viewable on an Explorer Trend
  • Azure AD Authentication
  • Additions to Sentinel authentication to login to different domains
  • Option to set read timeout for requests from P2 Server

Improved Handling of Data Marked as ‘Bad’ by the Historian or Other Datasources

There are many scenarios that may result in bad data being stored by a system.  In some scenarios these systems can recover at a later time, and then back fill the missing data.

Sentinel is watching this data in near real time, so if the data is not available at the time that it runs Sentinel needs to make a choice of running and processing the live data that has now been returned, or stopping and waiting for all of the data to be backfilled before it continues. 

Waiting for the data will mean possible new ‘Live’ events may be missed, so by default Sentinel will mark the data period as bad and will continue processing when live data returns.

Sentinel monitors can now be configured to wait for the data to be come available again. This is achieved by pausing when bad data is detected, and rechecking a data source a defined number of times at specified intervals, waiting for it to be present. When the data is determined to be good again, Sentinel will process the newly acquired data and generate historical events until it catches back up to the live data.

The new monitor configuration parameters determine the number of times a monitor will keep trying to collect data after bad data has been detected, and the amount of time to wait between collection attempts.  This combination will enable you to set how long to wait for the data to return.

If this time period is exceeded, Sentinel will default back to its previous workflow and will skip each processing interval until live data returns.

<Param Key="BadDataRetryPeriodMinutes" Value="15" />

Time in minutes monitor will wait before retrying due to bad data.

<Param Key="MaximumBadDataRetryCount" Value="20" />

Maximum number of retries due to bad data before raising a suppression.


Time Windows in a Trend

Sentinel monitors can be configured to create time windows that are viewable on an Explorer trend.

Time Windows selected in Monitor configuration:

Time Window options in Monitor configuration:

The option to create time windows can also be selected when a monitor is rerun.

If time windows were created when the monitor was run initially, the original time windows will be replaced by those created when the monitor is rerun.

Time Windows raised in Sentinel will only have an end time once the event is closed in Sentinel.


Support for Azure Native Authentication

Azure authentication can now be used to sign in to P2 Explorer, allowing a full cloud deployment of P2 Explorer, Shift Log and Sentinel. This gives companies the option of using either Windows Domain, or Azure authentication.

To enable Azure authentication, administrators are required to make some configuration changes, refer to Step 11 of the Fresh Installation section in the P2 Explorer Installation Guide for further information.

Azure authentication login dialog:

Note: Authentication can be configured by Windows AD OR an Azure AD authentication in this release.


Sentinel Authentication to Different Windows Domains

Sentinel users are now able to login to the application using different Windows Active Directory credentials than are on the client where Sentinel is installed.

This commonly occurs when using a VPN.  The local machine may be on Domain A, and the Sentinel machine on the VPN’s network may be on Domain B.  This change allows a user to login to Domain B.

Sentinel will still try to automatically authenticate using the credentials of the Client machine. If it fails for any reason, the Windows Security dialog will open, enabling the user to enter a different set of domain credentials.

For example,

[domain]\username


Option to Set Read Timeout for Requests from P2 Server

A new configuration parameter has been added to enable the setting of the timeout for any request for data or hierarchy from P2 Server.  This timeout is used for both the fetching of data, and also the fetching of Entity and Hierarchy information from P2 Server.

Previously, the read timeout was fixed at 15 minutes.

In most instances the default settings are suitable.

<Param Key="P2ServerReadTimeout" Value="120" />

Time in seconds to wait for data from P2 Server.

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