How To: Update Digi Remote Manager "Last Update" Time Daily via Automation

Digi Remote Manager® is a platform which is home to many devices and the data which they provide, both about themselves, as well as data about other devices and processes which they know about.

Being that some of these devices may only connect to the Digi RM platform to upload their accumulated data once per day (or even less), keeping up to date on the various settings and hardware state data about the devices themselves can sometimes be a challenge, since Digi Remote Manager only updates its cached knowledge of the device settings and states only under certain circumstances.
 

When Does Digi RM Update Its Cached Data Automatically?

Since a number of the devices which are added to Digi Remote Manager accounts are likely to be cellular devices, the reality is that Digi Remote Manager cached data is never automatically updated unless something triggers it to be, since doing so automatically would  lead to increased cellular usage, and therefore higher costs where metered cellular data between device and platform is concerned.
 

Times When Digi RM Cached Device Data is Updated:

  1. The very first time a device connects to Digi RM, the platform queries the device to learn about the device's various settings and states metadata.
  2. If the firmware version of a device has changed, the device will be queried the first time it connects with the different firmware version.
  3. When the refresh iconis used within a Device UI, when looking at the Settings or Files area of the device.
  4. A query_setting/query_state RCI web services request is manually sent to the device to request the information via SCI. 
  5. When the device is part of a Configuration-managed Group, the cached data is updated when the device is Scanned for compliance with the Configuration.
  6. An Automation is created to schedule #4 regularly (what the rest of this article describes).

 

Creating the Update Cache Automation

  1. Login to your Digi RM account, access the Automations area, then hit the Create button: 

  2. Under Details, give your Automation a Name (required), provide an optional Description, select the Handling options, then select Save and Continue to proceed:  
  3. A "Ping" step is already populated into the Automation at default.  This step can be deleted by selecting the "Trash Can" icon: 
  4. Click the + icon to add a new Automation step, then chose "RCI": 
  5.  To the right of the RCI name, select the "Click to enter name" field, then name the step Query Setting.  As the RCI Payload, use:  <query_setting />: 
  6. Drop-down the Advanced Options, slide the Allow Offline option to Enabled, select the On Error option as End, then hit the + icon at the bottom of the Step in order to add the next Step (the On End option can remain off): 
  7. Repeat steps 4 - 6 above, this time for RCI command <query_state /> (but this time,  without adding another step as in step 6 above): 
  8. Scroll up the Automation page to the top (near the Query Setting Step), then select Save and continue, which takes you into the Schedule dialog: 
  9. To schedule the Automation to run on a Daily basis, slide the Enabled and Repeat sliders On, the select the Start Time for the Automation, and Daily as the Every option.  Lastly, select the Modify Targets link to get to the Targetting dialog: 
  10. Automations can be targetted to run on Groups, Devices, or based on Tags.  Please make the selection as needed for your use-case, then Confirm your selection: 
  11. In the top-right of the Schedule page, select Save to complete creation of your Update Cache automation (after which you're returned to the Automations UI page): 

 


Automations UI - Automation Details 

From the Automations UI, the Update Cache automation can be selected, and from Actons drop-down, the Automation Details can be selected for a heads-up status of the Update Cache automation:



Selecting the Runs option (as in the image above) opens a page with additional details about the times the Update Cache automation has run: 

From the Devices UI, we see that the Last Update Time date/timestamp has been updated from when the Update Cache automation ran, and Description represents a Device Setting which changed since the last Run of Update Cache: 


 

Last updated: Dec 08, 2023

Filed Under

Digi Remote Manager

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