We believe that process control developer community needs a new generation of solutions that meet the following criteria.
1. It must be an open system with unlimited customization capabilities
The openness should be guaranteed through providing interfaces for custom components at least on the following levels.
1.1. Support for custom data sources.
Every customer application has a unique set of data sources it works with: programmable logic controllers (PLCs), OPC servers, databases, custom signal processors, custom data servers etc. When working with standard and well-known data sources, application developers can use correspondent components (data providers) that come with the solution or are available on the market. When custom data sources are involved, application developers should be able to implement their own data provider that can be easily plugged in to the solution. As an example, consider a custom data provider that can interact with a new type of PLC.
1.2. Support for custom data processing components
Some data processing components should be available right out of the box: live data server, historian, alarm server. There should be a way for application developers and third-party component makers to implement a custom data processing component that uses arbitrary data sources (see above) and produces some new data and/or interact with the user. As an example, consider a service that builds a consolidated report and sends email message when some data points meet some specific criteria. In other words, open system architecture should provide a solid basement for advanced analytics.
1.3. Support for complex UI functionality, including third-party UI elements
Many existing solutions have rich scripting capabilities that allow to create complex user interfaces. The trully open system should provide application developer with a powerful UI framework without even introducing any scripting engine or complex UI object model: it should use some mature and widely adopted programming framework (Java or .NET) that allows quick development of complex custom UI elements and re-using third-party UI elements.
Of course, the framework should provide some basic process control-related graphic primitives and controls out of the box.
2. The solution should work across network boundaries and firewalls without compromising security
Web application technologies have changed the face of any traditional types of business. Process control developer community have accumulated a considerable technology debt in this area. Web-based solution based on standard communication protocols will provide interested parties with easy access to critical data anytime, anywhere using standard channels: internet, intranet, virtual private networks.
3. Zero-administration client
Data visualization tasks should be performed by lightweight client applications that:
- perform minimal data processing tasks;
- create a rich user experience;
- require zero maintenance;
- are platform-independent.
At the moment, web browser-based client applications are the most common choice.
4. Rich and transparent configuration capabilities
The solution should store its configuration settings in easily accessible and transparent format, so developers and system engineers can perform complex configuration procedures using their favourite tools on all stages of the solution lifecycle: development, certification, deployment, maintenance. For example, when cloning a deployment from one production site to another, system engineer may want to to create a script that copies configuration files to target machines and runs custom scripts that change some entity identifiers in configuration files.
5. High availability
New generation of control system products should provide options for:
- increasing solution reliability by using redundancy;
- building scalable solutions with minimal effort ("just add servers").
Computers have become a commodity. Let customers use their hardware resources with maximum efficiency for getting reliable solutions.
6. Powerful graphics
At the moment, every major HMI software producer has it's own version of a complex graphics engine and it's own UI object model. The new breed of process control solutions should leverage the power of existing modern technologies and offer contemporary graphics at no cost.
7. Localization options
Application developers should have a flexible and natural way to make their solutions available on multiple languages.
We believe that technology base for this kind of product is ready and that CSWorks is the answer to the challenge. Read about CSWorks.