Adding a connection

Adding a connection tells BDI Cloud to start polling one data source on your behalf. You choose the integration that matches your hardware, supply the credentials that source expects, and from then on readings arrive on their own.

Before you begin

Have the vendor credentials to hand before you start, because the form will ask for them and every integration asks for something different. Depending on the source that means an API key, a username and password, a server address, or a file path.

Get them from the vendor system itself, or from whoever administers it. BDI Cloud Support cannot supply your vendor credentials.

You will also want to know the polling interval you intend to use and the time zone the source records in. The time zone is the one people most often skip, and it is the one most likely to make the data look wrong later.

Adding a connection requires admin access to the project.

Add the connection

1. Open Pipeline Manager. You can start from either view: the + button at the top of the connections pane in the flow view, or Create new connection in the table view.
2. Choose a template. Each one is a supported device provider. Filter by category — Environmental, Structural, Geotechnical, Geospatial — or search by name.
3. Configure it. Give the connection a name, then fill in the fields for that provider. Anything under Required must be completed before you can finish.
4. Choose Finish. The values are validated and the connection is created against your project.

The connection begins polling on the schedule you set.

Filling in the configuration form

The form is built from the provider's own field definitions, so field names come from their vocabulary rather than ours. An unfamiliar field will usually match something in that vendor's portal or documentation, and most fields carry an info tooltip explaining what is expected.

How different the forms are is worth seeing. The same wizard, one template later, asks for a host, a port, a project and a server timezone instead:

This is why there is no single list of what to have ready. What the form asks for is entirely determined by the template you picked.

Two things are worth care:

Credentials are write-only. Once saved they are encrypted and not shown again — the reveal toggle on a password field only works while you are typing it. If a credential changes later you update it rather than read it back to check.

Time zone and polling interval shape everything downstream. A wrong time zone puts readings in the wrong place on every chart and every alert evaluation, and it looks plausible while doing it. Set both deliberately.

After creating it

Switch to the flow view and find the new connection. Within a polling cycle or two it should show devices attached to it.

Devices appear on their own as data arrives — you do not add them. A connection with no devices after a couple of cycles usually means the credentials are reaching the wrong account or scope, or the source has nothing to report.

Devices can also register before any readings are stored, so a device that appears but stays empty is not necessarily broken. Check the connection's status in the pane before suspecting the instrument.

If the connection will not create

Re-check the entered values first, particularly anything copied and pasted, since a trailing space in a key or endpoint is a common and invisible cause.

Confirm the credentials work in the vendor's own system. A credential that cannot authenticate there will not authenticate here.

Confirm you picked the right integration. Some vendors appear more than once with different ingest modes, and the two are not interchangeable.

If it still fails, contact BDI Cloud Support with the project name, the integration you chose, and the error you saw. Do not include credentials.