Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility

Overview

StatusApp for Android smartphones is the most recent addition to the suite of tools OLCF provides for monitoring system status. It is available for download for free at the Google Play Store.

Information displayed by the app (both the status of systems and the list of available systems) is refreshed each time your app starts. It can also be refreshed on-demand by selecting the appropriate menu option (this is described below). StatusApp was designed with smartphones in mind, and most of the formatting work has been focused on its appearance on such devices. It should work on tablets without any trouble, although the display will not be optimized.

The app is designed to be fairly intuitive, but this page is provided as an instruction/reference guide.

Normally, StatusApp simply shows the state of the systems as of its last data refresh. Some users may want to be notified of a status change. StatusApp supports this through Google’s Cloud-to-Device Messaging (C2DM). With auto-notification enabled, StatusApp will notify you when the state of one of the systems you’ve selected to monitor changes. Because of the way C2DM is implemented, you’ll receive notifications even if the app isn’t running or the device is asleep. The notification won’t specifically show which system changed, only that one system did. Once you bring up the app, you’ll be able to see the time at which each system last changed its state so you can infer which one most recently changed.

The StatusApp supports “push” notification (automated notifications when a status changes, whether the app is currently running or not) via Google’s Cloud-to-Device Messaging (C2DM). Selecting “Auto-Notification” on the menu toggles whether your device receives these messages or not. By default, C2DM is disabled. If enabled, you will only receive C2DM notification for status changes on systems you’ve selected to monitor. Please note that enabling or disabling C2DM requires contacting multiple servers, so it may not be instantaneous. Additionally, you may not be able to immediately re-enable notifications after you disable them (or vice versa). While enables/disables usually happen quickly, if a server that needs to be contacted is down there may be delays while the connection is retried.

The first time you start the app, it will display the main preferences panel. From this point, you can go to the “System(s) to Display” panel to select the systems you want to monitor (the app is distributed without any systems selected). If you return to the main screen without selecting any systems, the app will display a note telling you how to access the “System(s) to Display” menu. That information is also provided below.

The main screen of the app shows the status of each system you’ve selected to monitor as well as the time this status last changed.

Above the system list are two timestamps. The one on the left shows the last time the status data (on servers at OLCF) was updated, and the timestamp on the right indicates the last time the app attempted to update its data. It’s normal for these timestamps to be out of sync. Status data is typically refreshed on OLCF servers every 5 minutes, but the app may refresh its data (either by an initial data query when it starts or at the request of the user) at any time.

Below the status list are the email address and phone number of the OLCF User Assistance Center. These can provide quick access to the OLCF support staff. If you tap the phone number, it should show up in your device’s dialer. If you tap the email address, you will be able to compose an email to the helpdesk via your device’s mail client.

The main screen is the only one with a menu. This can be accessed by tapping your device’s menu button while the main screen is displayed. There are four menu options.

Selecting Preferences will navigate away from the main screen and onto the preferences panel. More information about options on this screen are described in the Main Preferences section.

Selecting Auto-Notifications will bring up a dialog box asking if you want to toggle your current auto-notification setting (i.e. disable it if it’s currently enabled; enable it if it’s currently disabled).

Selecting this menu shows a simple status menu, indicating the current version of StatusApp and its release date, as well as an indication of whether C2DM is enabled, disabled, or whether an enable/disable action is pending. The about screen also has a menu (accessible via your device’s menu button) with a single option-Manual Registration. If you are having trouble enabling or disabling auto-notification, OLCF staff may ask you to send us some information via email to help the process. You don’t need to do this unless specifically asked…the fully automated process should work.

Selecting this will force your device to contact OLCF servers to refresh status information.

When you select ‘Preferences’ from the menu on the main screen, you are taken to the main preferences panel (to return to the main screen, tap your devices ‘back’ button). The main preferences panel provides a single preference option and three sub-panels.

The single preference available is Force Orientation. If selected, your device will display the app in a portrait orientation regardless of how you turn your device. If not selected, your device is free to change the app from a portrait display to a landscape display based on the orientation of the device.

The other options on the preferences panel open additional preference panels. These deal with notification preferences, the systems you want to monitor, and preferences relating to display of date/time stamps.

Tapping your device’s ‘back’ button when any of these additional preference panels are displayed will return you to the main preferences panel.

The notification preferences selection panel allows you to choose how you’ll be notified of a status change. You are only notified of status changes if you’re using auto-notification. You can choose to be notified via your device’s LED, by having your device vibrate, by using a ringtone, or any combination of the three. The first three options on the preferences panel are checkboxes that allow you to choose which way(s) you will be notified. The final item on the panel will open a menu of the ringtones on your device. This allows you to choose which ringtone if used if you select to be notified in that manner.

This preference panel is very straightforward. For each OLCF system known to the device (this information is sent to the device as part of the refresh operation, so it should always have a up-to-date list of systems), this menu will display a checkbox allowing you to specify whether or not you wish to monitor this device’s state (and potentially be notified of state changes).

Dates and times are displayed in several places on the main screen. This preference panel allows you to choose between several display formats of dates/times.

The first option, ‘Use 24 Hour Time’ allows you to choose whether times will be displayed in 24-hour (00:00 – 23:59) or 12-Hour (12:00-11:59 AM/PM) formats. The next option, Date/Time Order allows you to choose whether the date or time is displayed first and whether there is some separator (such as “on” or “@”) between the date and time. The final option, “Date Format” allows you to choose the order in which date elements (year, month, day) are shown. You can choose between several predefined styles.

Several dialog boxes may appear when using the app. These are for routine notifications, such as to let you know a network error prevented a status update, a system was decommissioned, a system was added, etc.

Users are right to question why an app needs specific permissions. While your device typically can give an overview of why a permission is needed, users are often left wondering exactly why a permission was requested. The preferences StatusApp requires and the reasoning behind them are:

Network communication: This allows the app to contact OLCF servers to download the current system list and current status information. It also allows your device to contact the appropriate servers to set up and receive C2DM push notifications should you opt-in to that.

Hardware controls (vibrator): This permission is requested to allow the app to control your device’s vibrate feature. This is to allow the device to notify you of state changes (if you opt into C2DM push notifications) via the device’s vibrate function if you so choose. The Android operating system will not allow an app to access this feature unless this permission is present.

Currently, the systems are displayed on the main screen and on the System(s) to Display preference panel based on internally defined orders. In the future we would like to offer user-defined sorting of the main screen. We are also interested in user suggestions for enhancements such as new features, different display preferences, etc. While we may not be able to incorporate all suggestions, they’ll certainly be considered. They can be sent to help@olcf.ornl.gov.