HMI and SCADA applications communicate with control networks using drivers designed to different vendor specifications. In the past this meant that each HMI vendor had to create multitude of drivers and driver interfaces to their products. This created a product development and support nightmare.
The OPC standard was created to solve this problem. Now, an HMI vendor can create a single OPC client interface for their software. This OPC client can interface to any OPC server on the market. Vendors, such as Omron, have created reliable OPC server that support their networks. So, when an OPC client is connected to the OPC server, the HMI package freely exchanges data.
The key features are as following:
• Omron OPC server providing third-party OPC client HMI/SCADA applications connectivity to Omron PLCs, Omron other PLCs and networks.
• Bridge between multiple vendor OPC servers using OPC client ActiveX control.
• OPC Client ActiveX controls turns Microsoft Excel and Visual Basic into OPC Client application.
• Set of Omron ActiveX graphical controls.
• Works with third party ActiveX controls.
• Script command set.
• Drag and drop toolbar.
There are 3 CX-Server OPC components:
1. Omron OPC Server
CX-Server OPC provides an Omron OPC Server for customers needing to exchange data between Omron PLC and Temperature controllers and OPC Client applications, typically HMI/SCADA packages.
2. OPC Client ActiveX Control
CX-Server OPC also includes an OPC Client ActiveX control for Microsoft Excel and Visual Basic. Using the ActiveX control customers can create their own OPC Client HMI/SCADA from Excel or Visual Basic without having to write any of the underlying code for the OPC data exchange between OPC Server and OPC client.
3. Graphical ActiveX Controls
Graphical ActiveX controls provide pushbuttons, data displays, and a data logging viewer. They can be used in Excel or Visual Basic. An Excel spreadsheet can be made into a “front end” to PLCs, saving development time in Visual Basic providing pre-built controls.