Tags linked to a test result

[Coert]

Hi all,

Is it possible to link a 'tag' to a test monitor --> test result. This should be very useful for 'lifetime' tests where data is measured continuously. Now tag are only linked to a test system.

Kind regards,

Coert Ansems

[GreyGrey]

The way you would go about doing this is by having your tests write tags as they executed. You could have them write to a common tag, or you could have them each write tags with their system information prepended, and then when looking at the data, query for tags that you are interested in. 

[Coert]

Hi Brandon,

Thank you for your reply. I know it is possible to create my own tags and using naming conventions or using the properties for this but then there is no rational link from test to tag, like there is for attachments. So if i open a test i see the list of linked attachments. It would be very useful to have also a list of tags visible which are linked to that specific test. 

I hope this clarifies a bit what i am looking for. Is this possible, or are there plans for this?

Kind regards,

Coert

[GreyGrey]

What would that list of tags consist of? Would they be tags created by the test? Updated by the test? Also, what is the purpose of those tags? Are you wanting to use them for data analysis? It's kind of odd because there isn't a 1-to-1 relationship between tags and tests and many different tests could all update the same tag. 

This sounds similar to how we treat measurements and data that is stored in the step. There, we store the data from the step inside of the database and then you can look over the data that has been provided by that step, or previous steps for analysis purposes. 

[Coert]

Hi Brandon,

Thanks again for your quick reply. Maybe it is best i will explain our test case:

We are doing a lot of different test for all kind of different components, a big part of our tests are lifetime orientated. So in those cases we will have a test running for 1 month up to 1 (or even more) years depending on the test. During such a test we would like to log/monitor continuously parameters and log them every x time (like (for example) every 10 sec,1 minute, 10 minutes...).  Now we can log them in different ways:

1. store data locally in tdms and upload a file attachment linked to a test every  x days (best option for now, but no live view, we have to wait after data file is logged)

2. store test step data for each measurement (we will have thousands of test steps, so not preferred)

3. log parameters using tags (Is a good option but there is no 1-to-1 relationship with a TestResult).

For us it would be nice if can define our own tag parameters (like we can now) and have a 1-to-1 link with the 'Test Result' for each data point. So one specific named parameter can be re-used in different test. It would be nice when opening the test result the list of parameters similar tag graphs can be shown.

Does my explanation make sense?

Kind regards,

Coert Ansems

[GreyGrey]

---

@Coert wrote:

2. store test step data for each measurement (we will have thousands of test steps, so not preferred)

---

Based on my understanding of your setup, this actually seems like a good option. By adding the measurements to step data, you would have live updates, and also could use the 'Trends' section of the step info to look at that steps performance over time. That trends view also factors in whether or not the inputs were the same so if you run the same step with a different input, it won't be compared against a dissimilar test step. '

One thing that I don't think would be a good idea would be to create a tag for every test run. That would quickly grow to a large size making navigation of the tag viewer pretty rough. Having a single tag per measurement in the step would also probably not work if you had multiple machines that would be running the same tests and thus it would be hard to tell which data came from which system/unit being tested.

An alternative using tags would be to create a tag unique to each test system (using a name like <machine_name.measurement>) which you could use to track the value of the measurements over the lifetime of the test. However, there isn't a native way to link the test to the tag. You could add the URL to the relevant tag as a property or a keyword, but text there doesn't turn into a hyperlink and so the user would have to copy/paste it into their browser if they wanted to see the tag history. 

Does that make sense?