Triggers are used to control when data is logged. The first step when creating a trigger is to make sure the Log everything checkbox in the Log Configuration section is NOT checked.

To create a trigger, press the Add button in the trigger section. You will be prompted to name the trigger and which CAN channel the trigger is to monitor. If the trigger is based on a message defined using the J1939 protocol, set the protocol to J1939. If J1939 is chosen, you will be prompted with the same J1939 options as described in the Filters section, but this time for the trigger’s parameters. Otherwise, set the protocol to None. Press the Next button and you will be prompted to select the type of trigger. If you select a CAN Message trigger you will be prompted to select the defined message whose reception will cause the trigger condition to be met. If you select a Signal trigger you will be prompted to select the signal whose value will be evaluated by the trigger. When you press the Next button, you will be prompted to enter the raw value to compare the signal value against and the type of comparison to be used (Less Than, Equal to, Greater than or equal to, etc.). If you select an external trigger, you will be prompted for whether the trigger should occur on the rising or falling edge of the external trigger. If a special event trigger is selected, you will be prompted to choose either the power on event, Disk full event, or Error frame received event as the triggering condition. If you choose the timer event trigger, you will be prompted to enter the number of seconds after power on when the timer event should activate. You can also choose to make the timer event periodic by checking the cyclic checkbox.

After you have selected the correct trigger type and press the Next button, you will be prompted for the trigger timeout. This is the length of time that the trigger condition is considered true once the trigger is detected. This value is useful when you have multiple triggers that must occur at the same time to start logging. Once you have entered the desired value and press Next you will be provided with a summary screen of the trigger configuration. Press Finish to create the trigger.

The pre trigger time determines how much data should be recorded prior to the trigger expression that starts logging is met. The post trigger time determines how long data should be recorded after the trigger expression is met. If the post trigger time is set to 0, logging will only stop when a stop logging trigger expression is met. The trigger expressions are created by entering the desired Trigger names in the expression field. You can use ‘&’ to AND two trigger conditions and ‘|’ to OR two trigger conditions. You can also use parentheses to control the order of operation within the expression. For example, “((Trigger1 | Trigger2) & Trigger3)” would be read as If Trigger1 or Trigger2 is true and Trigger3 is true then the expression is true. A trigger expression can be set to Start logging, stop logging, stop logging completely, or Pulse. Pulse means to pulse the external contact output on the CAN channel 2 connector. Stop logging completely means that the unit will not evaluate the trigger conditions again. The unit will need to be powered off and back on before the unit will log data again.

After configuring your triggers and filters, you should remember to use the Target -> Check Configuration menu item to make sure that the triggers and expressions can be translated by the configuration tool into a proper configuration.