A new wave of statisticians is changing the way the world is viewed. Have you seen the movie, Moneyball? It demonstrates that the way big teams evaluate ball players rarely reflects ability. Statistics count.
In his musings this month, Jim Pinto alludes to the way statisticians are changing the way the world is being viewed. On a somewhat smaller scale, SA Instrumentation and Control has some stats of its own to share this month. Some time ago, we invited the local scada vendors to a round-table to help us define the path that will take the annual Scada Review feature into the future. As an integral part of the magazine, we felt a need to fine tune some of the aspects in order to bring maximum benefit to end users, vendors and readers alike. A lot of work goes into this every year and, online, the statistics that Google collates from our website indicate significant reader interest in the endeavour.
All well and good, but online readership can come from anywhere in the world, and for any number of reasons. Around the table, the burning question on everyone’s lips: “To what extent are I&C readers influenced by the annual Scada Review feature.”
My colleagues and I debated for some time, but eventually it became obvious that the only way to answer a deliberately targeted question like this was with an equally deliberately designed reader survey. Then, there was the question of sample size. Given the diversity of SAI&C readership, what would be representative? We decided on a sample size of one hundred to start with, we would consider it representative if clear trends had started to emerge.
In fact 139 readers took our survey and the trends were unmistakeable. Contributing editor, Andrew Ashton, collated the results, which appear in article form in 'Scada Review influences readers'. To summarise here: Of the 139 respondents 53% read last year’s Scada Reviews and 47% did not. Of those that did, 34% replied that they had been influenced to contact a vendor, other than their usual supplier, for more information. The section respondents considered most useful, by far, was the end user.
Thanks to everyone who took the time to complete the survey, your input has been invaluable to us. If you would like to influence the selection of questions asked in this year’s SAI&C Scada Review, please contact me [email protected] and remember to watch out for a bumper fourteenth review feature this year.
The future of touch control
These days, a robust industry-standard design is expected as a matter of course for advanced HMI panels. However, according to Beckhoff Automation, operating units can only achieve genuine added value for machine manufacturers if they offer innovative technologies coupled with comprehensive application expertise. The implementation of technologies that are familiar from the consumer world, such as multi-touch and widescreen displays, paves the way for new operating concepts. In addition, an elegant, ergonomic HMI design that matches the respective application contributes to user-friendly, error-free machine operation.
In this month’s cover story, Beckhoff introduces its control panel and panel PC series with multi-touch functionality. Industrial applications can now utilise the familiar features from smartphones and touch pads for machine operation. This series offers a practical and versatile HMI hardware toolkit, complemented with mechanical push-button extensions, display sizes and panel PC options.
I hope you enjoy this issue.
Steven Meyer
Editor: SA Instrumentation & Control
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