There is no ability to easily expand all of the nodes of an AF element hierarchy and print or export for offline viewing by people who do not have PI System Explorer installed.

So in an attempt to view the element hierarchy outside of System Explorer I export the database, or even small portions of the element hierarchy, to try to view in Tree form in XML viewers such as XSD Diagram and many others, and keep getting the following error: There is an error in XML document (2, 2). <AF xmlns=''> was not expected

We have a large group of people who aren't PI users that we need their input into the structure of the hierarchy and templates. Therefore, we don't want to put PSE on all their computers for a variety of reasons, but we still want them to be about to view and drill down.

While creating and/or debugging analyses in PI System Explorer, I would like to have available an instant evaluation dialog.

This would be something I can bring up empty, and start typing (if in template, use the context of the currently selected Example Element) to evaluate a formula.

If I right click a formula or expression already placed in a variable I would like to see "Evaluate in Instant Window" or "Evaluate instantly", where the dialog is brought up with that text pre-defined. If the expression you right clicked contains time expressions (such as start time, end time) I would like to see these pre-evaluated, if they refer to other expressions or are set with PI Time expressions. One if the things I spend most time doing while debugging is changing "T+6h" and "Y+6h" to their full "18-Feb-2019 06:00" equivalents.

Another thing I spend a lot of time doing is going between the Element -> Analyses tab to the Element Template -> Analysis Template counterpart, to change things. If I was able to debug things for a template-bound analysis using an instant window it would save time.

I would like to trigger an event frame on a PI Point, however, that trigger may last for several days. During that time I would like the event frame to close at midnight and automatically reopen a new event frame for my event driven event frame.

Here is an example: Pretend you are measuring the outside air temperature, you want your trigger to trigger when it goes above 50F, chances are your event frame could go on for days before it drops below 50F. Instead of it to go on for days I want a new event frame to create each day while its above 50F and close the previous days event frame.

I have thousands of tags based on AF analysis, both auto created by AF and some which have been converted from ACE, PE, Totalizers to AF.

Looking at the tags in Point Builder, DataLink, or SMT I am able to tell by Point Source that the tag is calculated in AF.  But where?  We use a single AF database for our SCADA, AMI, and Generation groups so browsing for an analysis is quite time consuming.

It would be nice to have a PI Tag attribute that would show the "path" to the analysis.  \Database\Element\Child\Child\Attribute\Analysis and that this information could easily be discovered in all management and analysis tools (DataLink, Builder, SMT...)

Using PI System Explorer, it is possible to "Create or Update PI Points" in bulk across all elements or branches of elements. However, "Create or Update PI Points" resolves the substitution parameters of PI Point attributes. As a result, if you change the value of a substitution parameter that is used in the PI Point configuration, say %Description% and perform "Create or Update PI Points", the point does not update with the new value. You have to take an extra step and first reset all the PI Point attributes you want to change to the template using PI Builder. It would be good if there was an option with the bulk "Create or Update PI Points" to "Reset to Template" first.

it becomes increasingly difficult/unreasonable to keep adding more and more UOM classes when a large majority of them only contain one or two UOM's. The list of UOM classes is getting quite large. It would be more helpful to have another choice for UOM's that are needed but will not necessarily be used for any conversions.

One possible idea being a UOM class that can be marked/forced to be unconvertable . . . a Misc. UOM Class.

pH is a good example of a UOM class that has to be created that for all practical purposes only has one UOM and would never be converted to anything else.