Plugins so you can choose your features, or have custom features for your project....

Plugins expand the features and functionalities present in the core System Watchdog Software used on the Digital Sign supported by you. Simply by installing one or more of the plugins you can enable extra features, monitor specific devices and systems, and use our API for your application developers to talk to different hardware components and to log their own events in the system.

If you don't have the skills inhouse to develop your own plugins, or you have hardware or devices you need to monitor, contact us as we can develop the plugins for you at very little cost.

Examples of this include:

Current Plugins Include:

Power Management
Many Digital Signs are not required to be operational 24 hours a day, and although good to be green and conserve power, hard-powering off of the devices can damage the drive and components. Instead, this Power Management plugin allows you to specify time of day for the computer to power down into Sleep/Hibernate mode overnight (saving money and the planet) and automatically turn on again in the morning. Different days can have different times, and an interface is available for your application to initiate the sleep procedure.

Reboot
Although most applications and drivers in the operating system are usually well written and protected from system ‘leaks’ which over time can cause them to stop working, it is possible that badly written drivers, or sometimes 3rd party applications can contain a resource leak. Although the System Watchdog software will monitor all mandatory applications for this and take appropriate action, other applications and drivers cannot be monitored, so the Reboot plugin simply forcibly reboots the computer every day at a specific time to release all the resources and memory so it never becomes a problem.
Serial Monitor
Do you have a hardware device which needs regular monitoring but it doesn’t have an intelligent 2-way interface driver? An example of this would be a professional grade LCD monitor/plasma screen with a serial or USB port. The Serial port connection can thus be used for regular polling of the device using a command (e.g. ‘Turn on and change to the PC input’) to device, and waiting for a response. If an error message is received or no response is received, then the plugin reports a fault.

Serial Trigger
If your systems have support requiring manual intervention at some time (e.g. to open housings to clean screens, etc), it is useful to log the times when people do this to assist it tracking faults and other issues. By simply installing a push switch into the access doors of your housing and connecting it to one of three connections on any Serial port on the computer, this plugin logs the times  whenever these are opened and closed again.

Defrag
Depending on how often your computers are used and/or updated, you may find them slowing down over time as the data written to the hard disc gets placed in different locations (as it takes time for the HD heads to hop around to read it again). The Defrag plugin runs regularly when the digital sign is not in operating (using an interface to your program) to tidy the files up and keep them in long continuous streams for the fastest access.

Winbond Watchdog
Many professional grade PCs include a hardware watchdog produced by Winbond. This plugin communicates with the hardware watchdog and confirms the correct operation of the operating system and applications. In case that due to a hardware fault or driver fault the operating system has frozen (preventing the System Watchdog from repairing the fault), the Winbond watchdog will reboot the PC, and the Watchdog software will then report an unexpected reboot has occurred. (note other watchdog cards are also supported through other plugins).