VTS provides the ability to create user groups that can be used to restrict access to tags within the configuration toolbox based on an operator's department or job classification. Groups also restrict the members of one group from being able to see the members of another group.

This functionality is available for VTS Internet Client logins, as well as for local logins.

 

As an example, assume that you have a VTS application (e.g. "Umbrella") that serves multiple plants (e.g. "Plant A" and "Plant B"). Plant A's operators should not have control over Plant B's tags and alarms, and Plant B's operators should not have control over Plant A's tags and alarms within the Umbrella VTS application. However, a third group of users must see both Plant A's and Plant B's tags and alarms for administrative purposes. The application can be configured to have three different groups of users (e.g. Umbrella group, Plant A group, and Plant B group) to meet the requirements above.

When user groups are enabled, login names use the following syntax:

<GroupName><GroupDelimiter><Username>

where <GroupName> is the name of the group to which the user belongs, <GroupDelimiter> is one or more user-defined characters that separate the group from the username, and <Username> is a typical VTS security account user name.

Using our Umbrella application scenario, the security account for a user from the administrative group might be:

RPeters   (no group name should be used)

while the security accounts for operators for Company A might be similar to:

op_PlantA:JSmith

and the security account for operators for Company B might be similar to:

op_PlantB:MDonaldson

The following sections describe how to configure Groups and Realm Areas in your VTS applications.