*Park Assist Plugin

Open

Technical Article | TA-20201002-TP-26 VDG Sense | VDG Integrations | Parkassist Open

Open

The Park Assist plugin is made to ease the process of importing a Park Assist configuration into VDG Sense. The plugin will automatically perform the following steps:

• Add all Park Assist sensors to the VDG Sense device list

• Generate a layout with a fullscreen map panel

• Import floorplans from the Park Assist Server

• Placing “device status icons” to the maps to visualize the parking bay states

Configuration

Before importing the PAS configuration into Sense, please make sure the following criteria are met:

• The Park Assist server (PASE) is connected to the same network as VDG Sense

• All Park Assist sensors are added to the Park Assist server

• Each sensor has the correct position configured in PASE

• All floor plan images are added to PASE

Enabling Park Assist plugin

When everything has been configured in PASE, you are ready to import the configuration to VDG Sense. Log in into VDG Sense and open the configuration menu. Select the Plugin tab and enable the Park Assist plugin by enabling the checkbox next to the plugin name.

Connect to Park Assist Server (PASE)

In the plugin settings, enter the Host-address of the Park Assist Server along with the correct credentials. After the server address and the username/password have been entered, click ‘Save’. The status message should now state that it is connected to the Park Assist server.

Importing devices & floorplans

Click the ‘Import‘ button to import the Park Assist sensors and the Park Assist floorplans from the Park Assist server into VDG Sense. This process may take a few minutes depending on the size of the installation. The plugin will automatically add all sensors as devices into VDG Sense and name them accordingly. Additionally, VDG Sense will create a new layout which contains a map panel with the Park Assist floorplan images. The map panel will also contain a status icon for every device positioned on the bay coordinates which are defined on the Park Assist Server.

When importing has finished, you are required to log out and log in into the Client.

Updating

If the PAS configuration has been changed, because new devices have been added, it is required to re-import the device list. Sense will automatically compare the current device list with the new PASE configuration and will only import new devices. Sense will not remove devices if any sensors have been removed from PASE. These need to be removed manually from the Sense device list.

New sensors will not automatically be added to the map layout, and re-importing the map images is required to update the map panel. Note that when re-importing map images, any changes to the layout will be overwritten.

Operator usage

Map layout

The auto-generated map layout contains all floor plans located in the PASE server. On each floor plan, every sensor assigned to a bay number can be identified with a status icon. The icon color represents the current status of the bay.

Green – Bay unoccupied

Red – Bay occupied

Grey – Status unknown / Device disconnected

Double click on a status icon to open the assigned device in fullscreen mode. Double click again to return to the map layout.

Target panel

A great way to make effective use of the map layout is to create a layout with a ‘Target‘-panel. Target panels are used to display devices the user has selected without leaving the current layout. This means that the map layout will always remain visible while still able to select and view specific devices. To do this, either add a Target panel to the ‘Park Assist Maps’-layout or create a new layout which will be displayed on a second monitor.

For more information about the usage of the map panel, visit the Map panel article.