The first phase of its long-term internet strategy Wonderware Corporation has extended its industry leadership in the Windows-based industrial automation software market with the introduction of Version 7.1 of its FactorySuite2000 package of integrated application development tools.
The components of Version 7.1 have been Internet-enabled to provide users with the ability to view plant floor automation applications and manufacturing information across the Internet. Futuristix says that FactorySuite 2000, introduced in 1998, is the first truly integrated suite of software in the industrial automation industry. The tightly integrated bundle of six modular components was a quantum leap forward in automation functionality and implementation cost-effectiveness for users in virtually any industry around the world.
Version 7.1 of FactorySuite 2000 contains several significant enhancements, including the introduction of FactorySuite Web Server, a new server-based component that functions as the suite's data gateway for process and production information. Web Server integrates realtime information and control from the plant floor and makes it available to a wide variety of clients via the Internet or over a local area network.
Complete InTouch applications can be published to the FactorySuite Web Server, providing full functionality, alarms, history and realtime plant data to remote users via a standard Internet (HTTP) connection. In addition, FactorySuite Web Server can extend data and reports from IndustrialSQL Server, FactorySuite's real-time relational database, over the Internet using IndustrialSQL's client tools. FactorySuite Web Server provides users with a secure infrastructure, and supports Microsoft's standard security found in Windows NTServer, Internet Information Server (IIS) and Peer Web Server (PWS).
"This new version of FactorySuite is the first major step in Wonderware's overall Internet strategy," explained Mike le Plastrier, Managing Director of Futuristix-Wonderware. "It provides a solid framework for our future Internet offerings. Our new FactorySuite Web Server component has given us a new realtime data backbone - HTTP - to FactorySuite.
Enhanced InTouch functionality
In addition to FactorySuite Web Server, several ease of use and feature enhancements have been added to Version 7.1. The InTouch process visualisation component is now Internet-enabled, providing users with the ability to connect InTouch applications to the factory floor using a standard Internet connection. Applications can be viewed in Window Viewer (the InTouch Runtime environment) or in Microsoft Internet Explorer just as if they were on the plant floor LAN. "Now users can easily take an InTouch application and publish it over the web as well as look at complex graphics," le Plastrier added.
In reverse, Internet-enabled InTouch allows users to develop applications that run in a central location but connect to data coming from multiple FactorySuite Web Server sites simultaneously. Another feature enhancement is dynamic network application development (NAD) which allows a master copy of an InTouch application to be maintained in a central network location (server). Users can make dynamic changes from the server node and download them to the view node seamlessly; NAD can be configured to accept changes without shutting down.
Other enhancements to the InTouch component include:
p An enhanced script editor, which is now sizeable up to full screen.
p An enhanced toolbar capability which adds ActiveX support.
p Print screen functionality in WindowViewer.
p A new alarm logger utility that enables centralised printing, logging to a text file and logging to a SQL database.
Leveraging Microsoft SQL Server 7.0 OLE DB provider
The FactorySuite 2000 7.1 release of IndustrialSQL Server provides extensive new functionality in the server. Enhancements for IndustrialSQL Server include support for Microsoft SQL Server 7.0, an integrated and improved summary and event system, support for delta reimporting and realtime server capability through the new IndustrialSQL I/0 Server.
IndustrialSQL Server 7.1 takes full advantage of the new features provided in Microsoft SQL Server. These new features include improved performance and data storage management, as well as enhancements to the applications for administering and querying the database. There are also several significant high-performance relational database capabilities including auto-memory and space management, self-tuning, enhanced backup and restore and distributed management of a large number of servers. "In Version 7.1, Wonderware is also a full OLE DB provider," said le Plastrier. " With the OLE DB provider on top of SQL Server 7.0, we can now leverage the query engine in SQL Server 7.0 directly. This gives us a very strategic advantage in the marketplace."
IndustrialSQL Server now serves as the primary data management tool for all of the suite modules. It allows users to capture thousands of realtime plant floor data points simultaneously; provides mix-and-match of realtime and historical data for relating events to time-based data; adds event properties; and simplifies installation and configuration procedures.
The event system in IndustrialSQL Server 7.1 now has added functionality, including time-based event detectors, aggregate event actions and overall improvement in performance. In addition, the summary system now offers configuration of any time period for aggregate calculations. Both the event and the summary sub-systems have been combined, resulting in more flexibility. Its client tools further empower users with powerful viewing, reporting, and analysis tools. Two major enhancements to the client tools are a new reporting application and four new ActiveX controls. These ActiveX controls can be embedded directly into a user's own web page.
Component Enhancements Factory-Suite 2000 Version 7.1 incorporates new feature sets for all FactorySuite components. All application modules in the client/server package make extensive use of Microsoft's ActiveX technology to provide outstanding ease of use. The Windows NT-based FactorySuite provides a single common-install procedure for all of its integrated application programs and it deploys a single high performance, real-time relational database for all modules.
Major enhancements to the sophisticated application components of the Factory-Suite include:
p The InControlmodule adds new interfaces to many more types of devices. It also now contains fuzzy logic objects and new Active-X controls for motion control applications. Using DCOM, it provides distributed control capabilities.
p The InTrackWIP tracking module now includes ActiveX objects to build custom dialogs rather than just use pre-defined dialog boxes. It also provides enhanced scrap tracking and control features and new user control over inventory consumption rates.
p The InBatchflexible batch management module incorporates enhanced recipe development tools as well as ActiveX controls for access to batch execution information and sequencing and it now offers signature authority capabilities to meet new system functionality authorised by the Food & Drug Administration (FDA).
"FactorySuite 2000 Version 7.1 is a major enhancement of the extensive range of application capabilities provided in the original FactorySuite package that we began shipping in April 1997," said le Plastrier. "With our new Internet capabilities, Wonderware begins to fulfil its vision of delivering realtime information and applications from the factory floor via the Internet to remote locations anywhere in the world."
Futuristix
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