Update Asset Project From Destination Geofences
Update Asset Project From Destination Geofences
Against an asset in TG Online, we have an option under the Advanced Tab: Update Asset Project from Destination Geofences. The function of this feature is described in the blue tooltip when we mouse-over.
So what does it do?
When our assets make trips, if they end a trip in a geofence, the project at that point will be changed to the Geofence’s project. When we create Geofences, we can assign them to projects if we choose.
So, for example, if I had 3 geofences each set to the project “Marketing” if an asset ended a trip in any one of those geofences, it would then have it’s project changed to “Marketing”.
Key points:
- The project is changed on trip end – so while an asset is in transit on the way to a particular geofence – it doesn’t belong to that Geofence’s project yet.
- This only applies to future trips, from the point of setting up this feature
- Once it enters the geofence, the project is still not changed until the trip ends
- On leaving a geofence, again it remains in this project until a trip ends outside of the geofence.
- If the trip ends in a different geofence – the project is changed to this new geofence’s project
- It it ends outside of all geofences, the project is cleared
Other system features
We will discuss the possible use cases in the next section, but they are made possible thanks to this feature and some other key system features related to projects. Notably:
Asset Access
We can set user asset access to be limited by a project, i.e. their login can only view assets which are assigned to that project
Note – Asset History
History views, reports and other functionality is not impacted by the Update Project from Geofence feature. If a user has access to a certain project, they can see all the assets within this project. Should their account have the ability to view asset history, or reports, they will be able to see the entire asset history. The history is not limited to the time the asset spent in the project. If an asset is changed to a project, immediately a user with access to that project can see all trip history, report data etc against that trip. If this is an issue, considering restricting other user permissions (i.e remove trip history view, report access permissions)
Report Filters
Most reports can be filtered based on project, allowing us to easily report on sets of assets. E.g. we might want to know all trips done for a certain project, or time spent, or events etc related to this project.
Use Cases/Applications
They key use case for which this feature is designed for is the following example – consider an organisation with 4 or 5 work sites. Each site manager only needs to see the assets currently working on their site. So setup would be:
- Select the Update Project Based on Geofence option.
- Geofence each worksite
- Set up user accounts for each site manager, and limit their asset access by project
Then, when the asset first drives to site and ends it’s trip – it will be visible to the site manager (see note above about history). The project is only changed on the trip end – so the asset can’t be seen on its journey to site. Then, when leaving site, the journey can be seen, but the asset will disappear from view as soon as it ends it’s trip outside the geofence.
This feature could also potentially be used to provide customers limited access to tracking of assets which are doing work on their site. Set up would be:
- Select the Update Project Based on Geofence option
- Create a geofence on the customer site
- Create a login for this customer, with asset access limited by this project, and restrict other permissions such they can’t view asset history (i.e. just give them the Live View permission)
Then, when an asset drives to their site to conduct work, and end’s its trip (parks) – it will then be visible to this user account. When it leaves, it will disappear once it ends its trip.
If we are hiring assets/conducting work for known periods of time – it might make more sense to simply manually allocation projects or asset access, or make use of Asset Location Sharing
Closing Comments – Use Caution
Ensure this functionality is tested prior to use. It can be tempting to want to use this powerful, yet simple feature for more complicated use cases. TG Online simply reassigns projects each trip end, which may reflect what is going on in the real world most of the time, but not always. There may be a complex set of conditions for when a project really should be reassigned, in which case it makes more sense to simply manually switch projects. It is hard to automate things which don’t happen repeatedly, in the same way, each time. If you have a specific use case, contact DM Support and we can assist you with set up – or add it to the list of future improvements to TG.