Nathan

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Posts posted by Nathan

  1. Posted

    This one's gonna be fun I should have known better than to ask you of all people for more specifics. Remember that I was sided with Open Source software at the beginning of this thread...I'll try to play the devil's advocate. First off, I'm not going to count FactoryPMI in the "normal" industrial software. It might as well fall half way between both - the list of open source software used in the license agreement is pretty extensive, many of which you mentioned: Apache (web server), JGroups (web clustering), JFreeChart (graphing), Jython (Scripting), JEdit (text editor), and various other open source components. OK - charting. Good example! I'll give Open Source a big victory because, to my knowledge, none of the HMI vendors use a charting package that's worth a darn. FactoryPMI uses a custom version of JFreeChart (which is an awesomely powerful open source chart project). I've also written custom PHP web pages that use JPGraph (also a good open source project). However, Microsoft Excel charts are about as good as it gets in terms of bang for your buck (although not totally relevant in HMI discussions). I know there are a lot of very powerful commercial charting libraries like this one. SCADA vendors have chosen to do their own things. Retarded decision, but I don't think you could decidedly argue that Open Source charting is better than commercial. That is a case where you'll get better results if you have problems.

  4. Posted · Edited by Nathan

    Paul, I was asking the benefit of "upgrading" to the FactoryTalk licensing. What I really wonder is, do people really not know how the Rockwell licensing keys work? I've known how to backup/duplicate licenses in seconds without any special software for about 10 years. Don't worry Rockwell - I've been a good boy: sold lots of your software, never mentioned it on the forums and won't talk specifics. I can't believe that nobody has figured this out with so many posts (not this one) that dance so closely around it - a few Rockwell KB articles basically tell you. I have to think that others keep this one tight out of respect. In any event, you can freely move licenses across network drives with the legacy system. The USB thumb drives can be more difficult because some don't have the right volume labels or whatever they need to work. Workarounds do exist. Can anyone verify what I'm saying? I would probably disclose specifics to a moderator or paul in confidence. I still really think that more people know about this but are keeping their silence. That's why I thought that Rockwell chose to go to a centralized key system several years ago and I'm surprised the legacy system still goes so strong.

  5. Posted · Edited by Nathan

    For now, I agree with you. However, the face of open source software is changing. I predict more corporate owned/sponsored/run open source projects that sell top notch support plans. Sun and Red Hat come to mind. These projects tend to have mature communities that offer high level support, which is typically free. That said, as I stated in my very first and subsequent posts, companies like Kepware have their place. They provide an outstanding product and stand behind it. I see these companies co-existing with the evolving open source communities, although I think it would behoove them to embrace and support open source like Sun does. I'm interested in changing the fixed perception in this industry that open source is inherently inferior because it's "free". Companies can profit by supporting these products and selling "higher end" versions. They get the benefit of free advertising/marketing/training/support communities. Open source projects can thrive entirely without corporate backing. Paul - the bulk of your complaints with commercial industrial software come down to specific problems and company responses that you've dealt with. A software project, commercial or open source, can vary in quality from total crap to very nicely written. The quality of updates/bug fixes/etc can vary to the same extent. I think it's fair to say that either commercial or open source could range in each of these aspects. IMO, the real problem with industrial software is that it's such a niche market. The biggest players, both commercial and open source are puny. I have had my fair share of gripes at certain industrial software companies. I've also dealt with open source projects that are a total waste of time. I've also dealt with the opposite of both cases. It really comes down to who you're dealing with and the quality of their product/support.

  8. Posted

    Just curious if anyone here uses or participates in open source industrial projects. It's a shame to hear about so many people writing the same little apps from scratch. This is kind of a version of this thread from plctalk. I got flamed for suggesting that communication drivers ought to be free. How dare I even suggest that hardware manufacturers bundle drivers with their products! Or that users contribute to something without being paid!

  13. Posted

    Check out FactorySQL. It does require an OPC Server. The full blown version will also do "transaction-y" things like RSSQL does, alarming, and a whole lot more. They're working on a free, strictly data logging version. You can download a resettable 2 hour trial here: http://forums.mrplc.com/index.php?autocom=downloads&showfile=758

  15. Posted · Edited by Nathan

    MySQL is GPL. Your description sounds correct. edit - please read this. It's a fascinating interview with Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz on their open source business strategy. Sun's been doing well in the last few years. According to this, They've been adding to their open source collection including: Open Office, Open Solaris, GlassFish, NetBeans and Open Java. They also cite huge customers like: Google, FaceBook, Nokia and just about anyone who has a WordPress blog or server. They're obviously an integral portion of the oh-so-popular LAMP platform (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP).

  16. Posted

    Does anybody here care? I do! I think open source software is awesome and hope that it has a growing place in the "Industrial World". I wouldn't say this has much to do with PLCs directly, but it does have to with Enterprise Integration. I read about this on slashdot and commented about it in my blog.

  17. Posted

    I used to be all about VNC years ago. Hate to say it, but if you're in a Windows environment Remote Desktop is just better. I use Gotomeeting all the time though! It's not free, but very useful. IT departments will usually throw a fit about leaving a Gotomypc connection open (or block it), but be ok with gotomeeting. Works out well for: presentations, training, and troubleshooting if you happen to be across the Internet without anything pre-configured between 2 or more users.

  18. Posted

    Oh, I think that's a more unusual problem since you're connecting with Logix. Tim's questions are dead on. Also provide any additional info about specific error messages, logs, etc. But I'll just do what you would - a Google search. I have a feeling it's a "contact Rockwell" question - unless you happen to be running Vista...

  20. Posted

    Do they both have Internet access? Setting up a permanent VPN tunnel may be a viable option. Then each device could see the other as if it were local. My experience with AB modems were that they were: expensive, complicated, and didn't work well (an understatement). May be better now, but I wouldn't recommend them. I was successful with a project about 6 years ago that used phone gateways on each end to automatically establish an Ethernet connection. The 3COM devices were cheap and really easy to set up, but they were "home" devices primarily for sharing a 56k modem with a small home network. In that particular case the (commercial) phone bill to the customer ended up being outrageous.

  21. Posted

    Thought I mentioned this earlier, but guess not - Textpad is the bomb! Free version is great! I paid the $29 to remove the banner when it starts up, but more to support them because the product is so useful. Another good text editor is Ultra Edit. Works particularly good for: macros, programming, or editing HTML. http://www.textpad.com

  22. Posted

    Bob provided a good answer for concurrent connections to the PLC. You can get around this by using an HMI package that uses a number of PLC connections that itsn't based on HMI runtime clients (distributed or web based). Granted these software packages may be a bit heavy hitting for a Micro, but it's good info that's applicable for any PLC series. Adding concurrent HMI clients will not add connections to the ML in a well designed distributed HMI. It won't add read traffic if it's reading the same values that the other clients are. Obviously if a client is reading a new tag range, that will cause a PLC read. Writes should occur as if they were coming from any HMI node. This is how FactoryPMI with SQLTags works. RSView SE should work that way as should the heavy hitter "distributed" version of Intouch.

  25. Posted

    You're right, I hadn't thought of that. Supporting triggering and handshaking is important for a lot of "data logging". It wouldn't really support a batching type operation if the group could only "read" (OPC->DB mode in FactorySQL talk). I was trying to answer what I though was people trying to "pre-optimize" continuous logging.