Newbi question on Vista 20 installation & network security

[blakem]

Well for dsc I know the arm/disarm works like typing in the 4 digit code on the keypad. So if it is disarmed it will arm and if it is armed it will disarm. Also depending on if an entry door is violated during the exit delay will determine if it is stay or away mode. Althought it may work different with an ademco panel. Overall the arm/disarm function works well since you can see the alarm state on the same page and it auto refreshes for you.

At least on a DSC, one limitation I can see to the VPN into the local web interface would be that when arming remotely with the "arm/disarm" button, no delay zone is violated so it arms in stay mode and auto bypasses any motion detectors programmed as a interior stay/away zone. Now you might want to do that if someone is actually there but if you are doing it remotely I would assume you would want it to be in away mode. If you have no stay/away zones then you have nothing to worry about.

The PGM1 is for the program outputs of your panel and again I am not sure if it works on an ademco system or not. The word "toggle" leads you to think it is latched and will toggle between on/off states but it actually is pulsed and the length of time is determined in the alarm panel programming.

Hope that helps. I had lots of questions too, but just figured I would try it out and have liked it ever since.

[benkeim03]

Sorry to not keep up with you. the pgm programming is for DSC panels. Now you will need at least a 6160 alpha keypad it doesnt have to be perfect. You can leave it in your control cabinet, for future programming. You can do arming, disarming, basically all functions except for programming from the portal.