Testing of mimics for large scale systems

[tcpdump 0]

Hello everyone, It's good to be back. I have a bit of a quandry for you. I develop and maintain a large system which has somewhat over 1000 (yes that is right, 1000) different remote locations. This transposes into about 1000 different mimics. Some of these mimics are somewhat similar and template based, but most of them are site specific, or have some sort of site specific attribute about them. The software that I am using, is very limited in terms of object oriented capabilities and propagating changes through a template to all instances. The problem comes to the testing phases, how do you test a mimic? I know we drive a point and see if displayed on the screen. But this is a manual, time consuming and repetitive process. Resources are limited to do this. Is there any advice or guidelines anyone wants to give?

[panic mode 246]

ok, i was tempted to answer '42' but seriously: what is this "large system"? something controlled by plc? is it always same controller? how about hardware configuration? is it always the same? what software you try using for simulation? if this is what i think it is, i would: 1. add code to controller (first thing each scan) that replaces (overwrites) inputs with test values (received from PC and only to be enabled when testing). 2. make pc application with database listing each system with it's I/Os and addresses. any system response should be mapped too (delay, rate of change etc.) once particular system is selected application should read the database and generate controls (buttons, indicators, input and output fields). once you prove that correct item is generated for one object type, it should work for any system. from this point on, creating new system should be simple since it's in simple table of the DB (one can clone existing system for example and just adjust for differences etc.)

[tcpdump 0]

I guess I didn't really explain my problem carefully or detailed enough. The mimic developer has very basic functionalities. If I draw say a pump station, with 2 pumps, and then repeat this 50 times, then if I want to make a change to one pump station, I then have to repeat it 50 times as well. The 50 pumps I draw are not 'linked' and changes to one 'template' will not propogate to the other 50 sites. Is there any advice on this matter?

[PdL 71]

Citect has excellent solutions for these type of problems. You can create objects that are called Genies (smart or base), link them to popup pages calles Super Genies. You can define the genies is such a way and store them in a library that when placed on a page, it prompts you to fill in e.g. pump number, PLC controller, physical location, etc. It then fills in your I/O device tags e.g. Pump_#_ON, Pump_#_FAIL, Pump_#_SPEED etc where # is the number you fill in when prompted. The Super genie is not necessary but you can use it to have a popup page when the pump is clicked, to set speed or PID parameters or whatever. Again, once the Genies are stored in the library and set up using dynamic tag names you don't have to modify anything for every pump object. Read more here: http://www3.citect.com/mycitectnews/?p=4840 Of course there are other SCADA software systems that can do a similar thing but I have never come across one that can do it quite as good as Citect. The only down side is a Citect license especially for a lot I/O cost big $$. But if you see how much time you can save with such funtionality it makes up for the starting costs. For instance if you want to change anything on the pump genie, you only have to change it once. Add a variable on a pump to display manual control status? Only do it once. Hope this helps.