Property

Property Name

Type the name of the property (up to 50 characters). The name must be unique within the device type. (This name and the property name on the devices’ Service Agents must match.)

Label

Type the human-readable label for this property (up to 50 characters), useful because property names defined for a device type are sometimes obscure.

Access

Select the applicable access mode such as Read or Write.

Property Use

Select the property's use:

• Property - Use as a monitoring or usage property for devices of this type.

• Command Argument - Use as an argument for commands run remotely on devices of this type.

• Registration - Use when registering devices of this type; registration properties are used to evaluate devices for membership in dynamic groups. (See Configuring dynamic groups; see also About built-in membership rules.)

Data Type

Select the type of data, such as integer, associated with the property. Depending on your selection, you might also need to supply additional information:

• double – Specify the precision (number of significant digits).

• string – Specify the length of the data (up to 255digits).

• nmtoken (a white-space delimited enumeration of string values) – Click Add to open the Enumeration Values dialog and define all possible string values (space-delimited) for the property, such as No Yes or On Off.

Description

Type the description of the property (up to 255 characters).

Display Order

If you prefer to control the arrangement of properties on the Controls and Readings panels of the Content pane when a device is being viewed, use this field to define the display order of this particular property.

To use the default order, leave this field blank for this and all other properties.

To hide this property altogether, type –1.

Monitoring

Select the check box if the property is a monitoring (status) property, thereby making it viewable on the Readings panel and usable for the Run Command feature.

Min Value

Type the suggested minimum value for the monitoring property.

Max value

Type the suggested maximum value for the monitoring property.

Unit Display Label

Type the value of the monitoring property's unit of measurement, such as degrees Celsius.

Control

Select the check box if the property is a control (diagnostics) property, thereby making it viewable on the Control panel.

Min Value

Type the suggested minimum value for the control property.

Max Value

Type the suggested maximum value for the control property.

Default Value

Type the default value for the control property.

Access Mode

Select the control property's access mode, such as Read, Write, or Read/Write. (This will override the general access mode you selected above. For example, whereas a property's general access mode could set be to Read above, you could set the access mode of the property under the Control section to Write so that a user may set the property's value on the Control panel.)

Usage

Select the check box if the property is a usage property.

Rollover Value

Type the value above which the usage property "rolls over," that is, reset to zero. For example, a meter with three decimal digits would have a rollover value of 999.

Counter Type

Select the type of counter for the usage property, either Increasing or Decreasing.