Rules and alarms

Build rules that react to camera, input, recording, and server events, raise alarms, send email and signed webhooks, switch outputs, and move Axis PTZ cameras.

Content updated Print view rules events alarms automation webhooks email inputs outputs
Contents

Build rules in Configure > Events & automation > Policies; handle alarms in Operate > Alarms.

How a rule works

  • WHEN: any of up to 8 triggers starts the rule.
  • ONLY WHEN: optional conditions; Add schedule sets weekly windows in your chosen time zone.
  • THEN: create an operator alarm, run actions, or both.

Create a rule

  1. Select Add policy and choose what starts it: Camera offline, Motion detected, Video loss, Recording stops, Camera tamper, Input active, Storage nearly full, Site Node unavailable, or Other event.
  2. Choose the source and condition and Configure response. Camera-reported motion, tamper and video loss show Pending hardware qualification: unavailable until qualified.
  3. Enter Policy name, optional conditions or schedule, and THEN response.
  4. Cooldown ignores same-source repeats for the specified duration (default 1 minute).
  5. Test previews behavior without creating alarms or running actions.
  6. Save and apply saves and starts the policy immediately.

Save as draft preserves unapplied changes. Draft not applied offers Apply and Discard; active policies continue their current version meanwhile.

Each policy has an on/off switch; disabling requires confirmation describing what stops. History keeps earlier versions; Restore this version restores one.

Events you can use

  • Camera connectivity (online/offline) and video (available/lost)
  • Camera-reported tamper and video loss via events or email, once hardware-qualified. Sources identify on-camera or server-side detection.
  • Recording state, recording health and storage health (healthy, nearly full, degraded, unavailable)
  • Camera alarm inputs (active or cleared) and output state
  • Site Node health and database health
  • Virtual inputs fed by device emails, and virtual alarm panel zones

Responses and actions

ResponseWhat it does
Create operator alarmQueues an alarm with Severity (Information, Warning, Critical), Alarm title and optional Operator procedure. Resolve when the source reports recovery closes it when the condition clears.
Start recordingRecords with event pre-roll and post-roll; requires camera event recording enabled.
Send email notificationEmails delivery-profile recipients, operators and external contacts, in listed order.
Send signed webhookSends an HTTPS POST with a JSON body, signed with HMAC-SHA256.
Turn output on, Turn output off, Pulse outputSwitches a camera relay output or a Shelly output.
Recall PTZ preset, Move PTZ to homeMoves an Axis PTZ camera.
Arm area, Disarm areaArms or disarms virtual-panel areas. Intrusion also offers Bypass intrusion zone, Unbypass intrusion zone, Reset intrusion zone alarm memory.
Play audio clip, Stop audio, Set speaker volume, Sound siren/strobe, Silence siren/strobeControls Axis speakers and sirens.

Advanced action settings cover delay, deadline, retries, ordering and failure behavior. Notifications use the installation’s outgoing mail server.

Webhooks

Add destinations in Notifications > Webhooks. Public HTTPS addresses only; private and loopback addresses are refused. Enabling requires a 32–256-byte Signing secret. Request headers:

  • X-KalyteraVMS-Signature: v1= followed by the lowercase hex HMAC-SHA256
  • X-KalyteraVMS-Timestamp: the send time in Unix seconds
  • X-KalyteraVMS-Delivery-Id and X-KalyteraVMS-Webhook-Version

Compute HMAC using the secret over KalyteraVMS.Webhook.v1, timestamp and delivery ID, each followed by a line feed, then request body. Compare your calculation before trusting requests.

Device emails as events

Each Site Node receives camera and recorder alert mail. Configure Inbound email > LAN SMTP receiver (default 2525); under Virtual inputs, select Add virtual input. Set Input name; each gets a recipient address and accepts only its Allowed sender. Input mode: Any accepted message triggers per email; Camera alarms (start and end) decodes Hikvision, Dahua or generic formats. Attachments stay with events.

Plain SMTP has no TLS: use trusted networks only. It listens locally unless Setup’s Site Node SMTP used Local network.

Virtual alarm panels

Alarm panels > Virtual panels turns inputs and stream conditions into intrusion areas and zones. Add virtual panel: enter Panel name and Site Node; use Add area and Add zone. A zone’s Source is an email virtual input in Any accepted message mode, a Camera digital input, Video loss on the stream, or Stream offline. Save draft, then Activate panel once it has an area, a zone and every zone’s source. Deactivate before editing.

Panel rows or Operate > Maps offer operators Arm, Force arm, Disarm, Bypass, Include, Reset alarm memory. Panel-routed zones own their operator alarms: rules triggered by them run only actions. Rules can also arm or disarm panel areas.

Handle alarms

New alarms appear in Operate > Alarms; the sidebar’s Alarms shows their count. Filter by State, Severity, Assignment.

  1. Open an alarm for details, verification video (Live or event-time Playback), attachments and its location via Open in Maps.
  2. Assign to me takes ownership; then Acknowledge.
  3. Add findings and actions in Operator note.
  4. An alarm must be acknowledged before it can be resolved with Resolve. Reopen returns resolved alarms to New.

Recovery-resolving rules close alarms immediately on source recovery. Activity history remains.

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