Exploring the New Features of OPC Systems.NET UDP Broadcast/Receive OPC Excel.NET Renee Sikes Applications Engineer Email: rsikes@softwaretoolbox.com Phone: +1 (704) 849 2773

Agenda We’ll get here quickly! Introduce OPC Systems.NET Introduce new features UDP Broadcast and Receive OPC Excel.NET Live Demo – Connecting to Excel Summary Questions & Answers We’ll get here quickly! Here’s the agenda for today. We’ll start-out discussing why people are interested in Web-based HMI’s and why you should consider them if you don’t already have one. Then we’ll briefly discuss the different types of web-development as there many methods. We’ll then introduce the OPCSystems.NET software development platform and will explore why it is the premier choice for building Web-based HMI’s. We’ll move as quickly as we can to get to the live demo where we’ll actually create a web-based HMI. We’ll then wrap-up with a summary, finishing off by answering your questions.

OPC Systems Components Windows Applications Controls .NET, Alarm.NET, Trend.NET, Gauge.NET Web Applications WebControls.NET, WebAlarm.NET, WebTrend.NET

OPC Systems Components WPF Applications WPF.NET Mobile Applications Mobile.NET Data Management Database.NET, Report.NET, Recipe.NET, Client.NET, Route.NET, Excel.NET

OPC Systems .NET Benefits OPC Systems .NET provides these benefits: Central “always-on” tag repository = faster performance Tag data can come from OPC DA and/or Databases, including Excel Multi-Threaded for faster, and more Reliable operations Buffers data, eliminating data-loss for short outages as well as maximizing the performance of your web-link Modular, components available separately or as a suite Affordable, not as expensive as you might think OPC Self-Certified, for assurance in quality NO MORE DCOM HEADACHES Alright, so we now know what the point of this system is, so lets quickly gain an understanding of some of the benefits in the system, the very things that you can’t see, hear, smell or touch… Scalability: you know you need it! The system you implement today is likely going to grow tomorrow, and when those needs arise, you’ll need a system/platform that will give you that flexibility. Well, it’s in there and we’ll see what this means in just a moment. Multi-threaded: concurrent processing enables the software to be more responsive and utilize your computing power more efficiently. Likewise, put this system on a multi-processor PC and watch the performance increase. Buffers data: Zero data-loss is possible even with temporary network outages. Obviously this is a big deal, but you’ll see what this means in just a moment. Modular: Means you can buy just what you need, to keep costs down, or maximize on your investment and savings and go with the entire suite. Affordable: You’re about to see that there’s a lot to this system, but you’ll be surprised at how affordable and cost-effective this solution is. OPC Self-Certified: This is a big-deal. If you use OPC software, it should be Self-Tested by a minimum, if not, don’t use it. This is a seal of quality, meaning that the software has been to OPC Interoperability Workshops where it has been tested against other vendors software, but also tested by the OPC Foundation’s error injection server that passes bad and invalid information to the client to ensure that it gracefully handles and recovers from problematic situations. Oh, what’s that bottom bullet? Oh yeah, no more DCOM headaches… why? Because OPCSystems.NET is based on .NET technology and consequently uses .NET Remoting instead – which is the platform that Microsoft wanted us to migrate towards so that DCOM could die a peaceful death.

OPC Systems .NET Service (Tag Repository) How it works… Tag repository stores Data, and some history Data can come from OPC Servers OPC Connection is always ON eliminating connectivity overhead Applications see the data when it opens .Net Remoting transfers the data WITHOUT DCOM .Net Remoting OPC Systems .NET Service (Tag Repository) Data Source OPC Server PLC DCS Other

OPC Systems .NET Service (Tag Repository) How it works… Application requests an “update” of the items/tags it needs. OPC Systems .NET Server responds with values that have changed: If value remains same, empty data-set returned If 1-value changed, that value is returned If the value changed multiple times, all updates sent .Net Remoting OPC Systems .NET Service (Tag Repository) Data Source OPC Server PLC DCS Other

OPC Systems .NET Service (Tag Repository) Tolerance OPC Systems .NET Service (Tag Repository) Client Application Queue Local Network Internet Tag Repository individually “caches” data to each client If a client goes temporarily offline, it will “catch-up” on the next update. Applies to ALL OPC Systems .NET Clients (data logging, alarms, WinForms, WebForms etc.)

UDP Broadcast and Receive Broadcast all OPC Systems tag values to specified UDP clients Receive UDP broadcast messages of tag values from remote OPC Systems services Built-in security Value transfer is one-way Easy configuration

OPC Excel.NET Read and Write data in Excel Unlimited remote Excel connections to OPC Systems service without NetDDE Uses RTD function to communicate Combine with other OPC Systems features to get data from Excel to Visual Studio applications, web applications, data bases, reports, etc.

OPC Excel.NET Free configuration utility to help you properly create formulas to read/write tags, or read timestamps Confirmation of data exchange for added reliability Connect to Excel 2003, 2007, and 2010

Live Demo UDP Broadcast/Receive Demonstrate Excel worksheet Set up UDP Broadcast on VPC Set up UDP receive on host Demonstrate Excel worksheet Read a tag with its timestamp Write tags View Security Settings

Contact us for pricing for higher tag counts Affordable Tag Counts 1 Feature 3 Features 5 Features All 15 Features 100 Tags $195 $495 $735 $995 250 Tags $295 $745 $1,115 $1,495 500 Tags $395 $1,995 1,000 Tags $1,245 $1,865 $2,995 2,500 Tags $795 $4,995 *Support and Maintenance contracts are available for 20% of the total license cost Contact us for pricing for higher tag counts No OPC Server Connection or Client Connection Counts No Text File or Database Connection Counts Code-less development tools are Runtime-free Fully documented, lots of examples SmartClient Technology ready

Other Features Available Data Logging (text files and databases) Report generation Alarm logging and notification Windows Forms development tools Recipe management

Summary Convenience: Quickly and easily build & deploy HMIs Scalable Framework: allowing your system to grow Reliable: OPC Self-Certified, plus Buffering Alerting: Data Logging, Reporting, Alarming & Notifications Open: API provides interface for your apps to control Affordable: modular, buy what you need. So to wrap-up: We’ve seen what convenience means in terms of rapid development and easy deployment means We understand some of the ways in which you can scale-up your system We can trust the software because of its OPC Self Certified status, and also trust in the communications infrastructure which can eliminate data-loss for short network outages. You’ve got the alerting capabilities for alarms and reports. You’ve got an open API for those developers out there that want and/or need to build custom software to further enhance/extend their overall systems. And it’s affordable folks. Go out there and add-up the cost of equivalent tools giving this functionality – that’s assuming that you don’t have to re-invent parts of the system yourself.

More Information www.softwaretoolbox.com/opcsystems … get through to an expert! Questions: Renee Sikes: Email: Technical Support: Tel: +1 (704) 849-2773 Web: http://support.softwaretoolbox.com rsikes@softwaretoolbox.com So at this point, we have finished the Presentation and now I’d like to open-up the phones for Questions and Answers. www.softwaretoolbox.com/opcsystems