Travel Notes for 2012 reflections at Christmas time

Christmas  Tree in Beach Rotana Abu Dhabi Dec 2012

Advent, the season leading up to Christmas is a time of rush and reflection in Australia. Those final trips to customers, the school concerts with parents and close of the year and the change of season to Sydney summer strong and hot every day, in the evening with the bright sky pushing in through the windows, flung open for any breeze possible. With Christmas tree lights flashing, I reflect on the year gone by. A year of much action in Invensys.

The sound of the cornets and tambours come floating through from the streets of Seville, where the streets full of flamenco colors where trams stroll along with the crowds and the bands in procession.

 where down the road are bullfights  We sip Mojito's after a long conference day [no siesta mind]and at midnight cathedral bells on automatic peal out into the Spanish air.  Large technical companies have many product gurus who need to get together and sales conferences have an opportunity for discussions all at the same time. It was here I met up with our Russian team from Moscow. We talk over things, chat, and come up with new ways to cooperate. We talk till 3:00 am at a restaurant where everything was 2 euro, among the bullfighters fresh from their.. How did Hemingway put it.?. in any case where the sun also rises. Sleepless but happy in Seville.

And no sleeping either in Madikwe, South Africa, a flat ancient grassland along the Botswana border, that day an Elephant decided to chase us hard in frustration while we discussed graphic scenery on multiple screens and SCADA object deployment and scanning drivers in the wild. Yet the animals in their own society lived in complexity, just like our own company with it's multiple product lines engineering teams, conference calls and meetings. That same society now expanded this year through the use of social networking and blogs, just like this one, now a year old. Technical blogs can be somewhat esoteric. Still dawn cold in the game park is magic and a joy to watch the buffalo, elephants, rhino. The tracker scanning the horizon for animals to watch and photograph.

Back in Foxboro USA, the Patriots played football, and the friendly Parrotheads turned up for their annual Jimmy Buffett concert. Yet before this I had landed in Los Angeles with an empty revolving luggage belt because lightning was all around on the airfield apron. Our HQ is in Boston and Rick Morse, our fearless leader was leading technology reviews at the time.

Moscow's weather was variable from sunshine to freezing rain forming balls of ice on your hair on contact.  They said I should have brought a coat and ditched the flip-flops on arrival - no surfing in Moscow.  Traffic was tough to.  Taxi's measuring cost in terms of time rather than distance, but if you like you can just flag down anyone an pay them to take you places.  All the same, I got used to walking places and down in the subway you can buy things from small kiosks… my eyeglasses broke, and have you ever tried to fix eyeglasses in a foreign country with no tools and no spare pair ?  I ended up in an electronics superstore looking for pliers and screws and.. Ok a magnifying glass.  What a way to spend a sub zero Saturday. At night we either frequented the 100 Tons or the restaurant across the road where one Friday night I think, no I am sure I saw a whole bull calf being roasted on a spit, while I sipped my simple traditional Borscht soup. I definitely have to thank Lydia Bolotina for her assistance @ Invensys Moscow. 

Spasibo i schastlivogo Rozhdestva

Christmas also makes you think of food and obviously restaurants, there is a wine bar down in San Viejo where our cyber-security guru Paul takes time out to play double bass solo. I was there because when travelling you just have to nab people wherever they hang out, and sometimes after hours.

But sometimes it's really nice to be invited to stay at one of our colleagues places and down in Johannesburg I stayed with Dawid Sadie and his wife, with 3 Shar Pei dogs and thanks we had a Braai together. The dogs barked each morning as soon as I stirred.  No matter how quietly I got up and crept to the bathroom, the dogs would bound up the stairs and give me a brash welcome with their friendly slippery fur coats they have. Wonderware South Africa has an excellent client base and a great team of people to support them and they really put on a show at their X-Change 2012 conference in Sun City. If you click on the link you will find a chance to get there for 2013. Definitely recommended.

The desert down in Al Ain - So glad the car operated just fine at 100mph in 50C heat.  Great radiators and air conditioning are essential.

In Xuzhou China the cabs are all blue. We were there meeting up with Sinopec.You get in and directions are given and the drivers take off at speed. Paul Kevin and I had to plead extensively with the driver to please stop and put the trunk down.  Eventually he did and the luggage was secured with a bang, followed by the door and the exhaust as we started off again.  Now it's a bit unfair since I know that most people can't read blogger sites in China.  I have to figure out how to get this content hosted there in the New Year.

I landed in Dallas in August, then drove down to Austin for the ISA Sales and Marketing conference.  Life at the classic Texan grandeur of the Driskill hotel where we met on the mezzanine and discussed, just how do you use social networking in our industry ? A fantastic group and I was happy to be on the panel run by Julie Fraser along with peers in marketing from Siemens and Yokogawa. They told me I was on a haunted floor - but typically too busy on conference calls to notice any temperature change or creeping creaking floorboards. Maybe next time.  Our team captain lives in Milwaukee, and I had the opportunity to drop in and have a guiness on tap in his basement bar.  My twitter avatar captures a moment in the telephone box installed there. Now I have facebook friends and twitter followers including some of my competitors.

It's been a good year, if your reading this blog and you remember anything of the events described, please feel free to add or comment on some of the wild inaccuracies there may be contained within.  Over the course of the holidays downunder I should add some graphics to the experience.  

Certainly I met and discussed SCADA and it's science with so many people it is impossible to name them all.  I kept business cards and many happy memories which is great to reflect on coming into Christmas week.

Would like to wish all bloggers and reader a happy Christmas and also best wishes for the New Year 2013.

CJS - Abu Dhabi.

But ten heads without wit, I wene as good none..

Single Headed Redundancy

All animal mammal life, including human life has a great deal of symmetry and therefore headwise redundancy of sensory input.  Yes we only have one mouth, but we do have two eyes we have two ears and we have two nostrils... also apparently two brains in one as well.  So apparently Apollo had a redundant twin sister, Artemis.  Diversity in power, the power of two gods being better than one, or even take one if not the other.

"Some heades haue taken two headis better then one: But ten heads without wit, I wene as good none." - 16century Proverb.

 Artemis : flickr photo attributed to Efthimiadis.

In this post we can look at the overall aspect of redundancy where we have redundant measurements providing signals to redundant local real-time processors.

Last invensysscada blog post if you recall, discussed configured processing rather than programmatic processing.  In this post I hope to show how those same intrinsic data functions can be used in real-time to resolve the choice of measurement based on reach-ability and a configured priority.

Intrinsic Data Functions

There is a migratory bird that comes down to our Sydney area every late spring. It's a native cuckoo.  I know this bird now but have never seen it.  Only hear it, particularly at 3am in the morning with it's demented calling echoing in the night.  In the daylight though there is no order in the bush. All the trees are crooked and the branches too. I went looking for the bird.That's what I did !, Couldn’t find anything. Lots of trees, sometimes sticks. I had my binoculars up their till my arms and eyebrows hurt. Looking through all the scraggly gum trees with their branches going every which way. Couldn’t see a thing.  There though.. a movement, I saw it.  The picture changed and suddenly I could hear it, see it, and understand that bird on the branch way over there, but now an instant later, it had my full attention. I slowly raised the binoculars.

The Remote Gate Diverse System

'Cloud Gate' - Millenium Park Chicago

Today's blog post is inspired by Anish Kapoor's beautiful 'Cloud Gate' in Chicago.    It is a public sculpture to play and interact with in any weather.  I aim to go see it touch it with one finger and look at the city go by one day. The blog post itself is just like that - a single touch to a gate of the kind of diverse engineering which takes place at remote locations. [The photo courtesy of  Lisa Yarost.]

Most people think of remote terminal units and remote systems as an atomic black box, doing a certain job, somewhere far off, with a means to communicate. The black box has become a citadel, a complex arrangement of interacting intelligent devices which need a gate through which to communicate.

What does it look like inside that far off citadel, and what kind of architectures support it ?.  What follows is a brief introduction to the story of the development of the Gated Diverse Architecture.

Switch On Switch Off and Sleep and Wake Up

Power Switch

It's been a while, since I switched on blog.  We make  SCADA technology which has to be there when the chips are down - powered down that is.  Something as simple as a Power Switch can create a whole design controversy.  This blog post is a discussion of how simple something like a Power Switch can get.

Front and centre on the SCD5200 CPU is a big red power switch. It has two states, On and Off.  What I like about this is that is means what it says.  When you switch it on.  Power is applied to the brain of the CPU and it's bus connectors and off you go things start up and operate.  Switch it off, and the power is disconnected again and everything goes dead. Or does it ?..

Distributed Focussed Availability

Distributed and Redundant Systems Architectures

Any automation system component may fail, usually at an inconvenient time. Whenever a failure happens, some part of the operation will be affected.  What and for how long depends on the way in which the automation system is arranged.  This post covers two methods of arrangement.  Distributed on the one hand, where the automation functionality required for different parts of the plant is distributed with the plant. Redundant on the other hand, which centralizes functionality and provides high availability through the provision of a duplicate backup system. Invensys provides both redundant and distributed RTU types to cover many different forms of remote automation architecture.

Close the terminal cover door click, please.

This morning I am traveling to Melbourne Australia for a few days. While there I will be talking to one or two of end users about design - electro mechanical design, of our SCD5200 IO terminal assembly. The unique SCD5200 design has been stable since it's introduction 10 years ago, thereby begging a 'why change it ?' from our team as well as our end users.

SCD5200 remote terminal units are compact with a reasonably high density hard wired IO. The mix of IO type {Discrete,Analog} and DC/AC voltage levels {24,48,129} provides convenience but needs special design consideration.

The potential design change, would be based on a requirement to increase the insulation thickness of the end user wiring connecting to the assembly. No it's not about increased voltage levels, nor about an increase in accuracy, not current rating nor actual wire cross section.

Being Eco Friendly with User Manuals

My wife and I recently bought a digital piano - a decent one - you know the kind that comes packed and needs someone competent to assemble as a piece of furniture.  It plays well, and does MIDI in and out as well as turn somersaults at the flick of a USB port. All that in addition to having a nice keyboard and music stand.  "Grand Piano" is really grand. All the features and functions seem to work brilliantly. I started reading the handbook - pictures - graphics - nice step by step instructions.  Now if only we could make handbooks like that - with all the options described in an easy to use way.  I feel inspired to make some improvements.

I read further through the manual.  I mean - how easy is it to connect a USB cable, and select from an easy to read menu.  Probably didn't even need the manual.  Nevertheless - I read further - .. Suddenly it caught my eye - There is a section in the manual with a "WARNING - Be careful not to open the lid with a small animal sitting on the piano", or something like that. "... or else the animal may be trapped inside".  Then very helpfully the manual goes on to say, as all good manuals do.. "If this happens, call our customer support line for advice on what to do".

Perhaps in my next improved version of the SCD5200 RTU manual.. reading "Be careful that there are no animals/critters waiting at the cabinet door before you open it, in case they get trapped inside".  Oops - I can just imagine the call to the well known call centre.  I rest comfortable in the knowledge that probably only a gecko could get trapped inside, and with no fans, and it being not too hot inside normally - comfy really - the gecko would survive long enough to be able to get out again.  Lets hope it has a security tag.
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Seriously, If you would like to get access to any of our product technology manuals in .PDF form, you should register at our Global Customer Support site.  Registration if free and open to bona fide users, contractors, and Invensys employees.  You can quickly navigate to the SCADA support manuals on the "OUR SUPPORT SERVICES" page link at the side of this post.



Original Photo - Gecko Glasanhanger - flickr - Greentarade - Modified for use under creative commons licence.

Keeping the lights on - Upgrade or Expand

Invensys supports a large number of SCADA systems products supporting the supervisory control of many large infrastructure projects. The products themselves have extended life-cycle support.  These products are supported through last time buys, re-design and other means of functional replacement to make sure end of life components are available to enable manufacture to proceed throughout the service life of the products. 


This post is a fictionalized story of the kind of issues that are considered when doing upgrades for systems installations. Any resemblance to a particular site, people or customer is purely coincidental and the story could be set anywhere and in reality might result in a totally different outcome.

Evolution - Revolution - Techno Modernization Solution

A Technical Evolution [1]

In this series of blog posts, I intend to make some searchable notes on the evolution of control systems hardware.  I say the word evolution carefully here.  What I can see however is that regardless of availability of key technical components, certain evolved arrangements of technology create a requirement for their own continuation. I will be exploring a number of features of this kind of evolution.

Evolution of SCADA Technologies - 1

C25 Remote Terminal Unit

There is nothing quite like working for a controls automation and engineering company for bringing high social-wc3-tech warriors down to earth. Probably uppermost in a controls product manager's mind is the support of long term useful plugged in technology. The automation that manages the control of plant and infrastructure is very static, and I have to say, totally anti-social.  Yes, believe it or not, social networking is NOT required to enable control systems to work.

The photo shows a single board Remote Terminal Unit, originally created in the 1980s using VME bus technology.  This was called the C25.  Although the C25 is now classed as obsolete, there are still many of these in operation on critical infrastructure throughout the world.  These days we replace these older remotes with the newer modular Foxboro RTU technologies.  The fit is close.. but not exact.  Features of the older technology which tend to change are the:-

• Wiring connectors - Older terminations
• Communications - instead of using Bell 202 we might use TCP/IP
• Protocol - instead of using Conitel - we might use DNP3
• User Programs - now here is the real challenge - these were generally built in older languages - early derivatives of BASIC or C programming - these days we might transition these to SALL programming with it's more protected logic code. IEC 1131 standard programming might also be required. 

Many of the components on these boards are difficult to find.  Repairing them is a challenge.  We tend to create newer technologies which try to extend the role and function of the older technologies, with a minimal installation cost.  I decided to read the book by Kevin Kelley - "What Technology Wants".  I believe that there is something about the use of these technologies, which have to remain in place without moving, without disconnecting, and without modification for over 30 years, which has to be explained.  I will be doing more posts on this topic as I embark on my travels in the next month or so.

A WEARABLE CONE of SILENCE

A non wearable Cone of Silence

So eventually viewers/followers, I the younger got my 'string can telephone' and out of frustration with it's application in the thick scrubby bush, I gave it all the toss.  Since real telephones had already been invented, why bother with a tangled string holding two can's together?

Vacating the Bloggosphere - Quel Surprise !

Lovers Lock Bridge - Paris

I highly recommend 'dive bombing into the river of the non-bloggosphere now and then.  Imagine the bloggosphere is the sky that we breathe and look at each day.  Yes, each day we get up and breathe in twitter, facebook, blogger, wordpress, etc.. for a variety of worldly reasons.  Imagine a day comes when you just don't do that.

X-CHANGING INFORMATION and COLLABORATION EVENTS

Laser Lights, Music, Fireworks - make the event come alive

I feel somewhat inspired to write, having been away so long, about something totally different.  I've spent some weeks now away from the usual thought processes on technology, and now have been involved in an X-Change event in South Africa, a holiday vacation in Paris, and a sales kick-off for the North American region.  All these things are the normal aspects of life for product managers in our company.  Apart from the gruelling nature of fighting over budgets each year, we, as product managers, then go on the road, usually in April May to try to explain strategy and product direction to the people who have to take the products to market.

Still - not sure how much to say about either event, except that both were in my view very well done and very enthusiastically received by their audience.  X-Change was held at Sun City, and the NA Sales Kickoff in Orlando.  Both these hyper-real worlds just happen to have a great location, great views, big meeting spaces and are really perfect for these kind of events, with around 400 or so participants.

Of course we are used to the now common fact that mostly we all know each other, and we see each other every year.  I struggle to remember names associated with faces, particularly since I meet most around once per year.  We are a team though and I probably am copied on, and copy most of my colleagues and friends on one at least of the thousands of emails written and maybe trashed throughout the year.  Others must have a tough time too, which is why we all wear nametags in big print 'round our necks.

Invensys is a large company, but what makes the company is it's collection of people who work through issues and create a kind of cameraderie.  Remember we all came from differently branded and typed companies long back, and through a process of amalgamation and cost reduction over time, have merged into a great company with a great future.  All the while retaining the key brands of products which go to form the portfolio of solutions we need for our customers in the market.

A gladly meet the press and pr people who turn up at these events, and who ask me when I am going to write the new new article of the thing we need to talk about... remember ?

I gladly meet the account managers which have struggled to handle customers, for which things have or have not worked out so well. I am surprised and sometimes really happy that people in far flung countries have managed to solve and resolve issues with the minimal help, that I or anyone could provide.

It's not all discussion at these events.  A big part of the psychology of the events is the entertainment mixed with the educational and directive content we provide.  In some cases there are fireworks and dancing girls, and in others a band playing with live karaoke.  Entertainment involving dancing music and fire seems to date back to the stone age, and carries on today.

You know, even from way back people used to say, what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas, but I believe that these events do have a lasting effect on the ability and nature of collaboration throughout the year.

So now I am back in my home office far from the people and the fireworks.  I made a lot of new friends and relationships and hope I didn't burn too many or say too many tough things for people [which happens at times].

A "string can" telephone as an OSI protocol stack

Picture a protocol stack

So since it's communications month on this scada blog, I thought a brief intro relevant for a warm up. Let's start by taking a look at something old and somewhat familiar from childhood and recast it in terms of current work on open standards and usage. The opening graphic shows a sequence of communications between 4 entities.  Real implementations of protocols involve not only message translation and abstraction, but also a variety of state machines to help each entity understand the probable state of the other entities involved in the communications.

Protocols are to communications, what algorithms are to computing.  What is interesting about protocols is that they have always been application specific, and always multi-layered.  However with the advent of the categorization of the Open Systems Interconnection [OSI] stack, they have become a little easier to describe and therefore manage in terms of open access.  This month we will start with the 'string-can' telephone, and move through some of the key protocols used in SCADA up to the newer 'sets' of protocols which operate in concert on high speed ethernet.

I call it the string-can telephone, but it is also known as the 'lovers telephone' or 'tin can' telephone. I know of many children's books had methods of creating such a device for communications.  Other related devices included voice tubes, sometimes used on ships and offices in the latter part of the 19th century.  See figure 2 for what we need here. People speaking two different idioms, a tin can each, a whistle each, and a long piece of red string.

Now I recall trying out the 'string-can' telephone and based on my experience I have created a graphic using the now familiar 7 layer OSI stack.

The left right plane of the figure shows two protocol stacks.  The left hand stack describes the protocol from the point of view of the American named Mary in this case.  The right hand stack describes a similar protocol from the point of view of the Irishman named Gerry in this case.  OSI decided that the best way to categorize 'open' protocols would be to describe 7 distinct layers, where each layer can communicate either up or down to the layer just above or just below, and which corresponds to a similar layer on the other end of the communication.

In our case we have Mary and Gerry discussing something but in order to do that they employ a fairly complex but well understood protocol stack.

The Media Layers

Layer 1 - Physical

The OSI stack contains layers 1-3 which are generally associated with the media over which communications are transmitted.  In the example, Mary and Gerry decided to use a piece of RED string. This is the physical connection to be used for communication.  Now we know the string cannot transmit audio if it is not under tension, and so we say TAUT STRING for the definition of the physical layer.

Layer 2 - Data Link

The second layer uses the lower layer to communicate but acts as the method to link data from the upper layers onto the string.  In this case we need a can of some kind.  A beer can for Gerry and a Soda can for Mary.  The only requirement is that there is some kind of can on the other end of the string to make this work.  The can converts audio signals at one point to compression waves in the string and vice versa at the other end.

Layer 3 - Network

In this case Mary and Gerry have a private point to point communication, so we would describe the network layer as being not applicable.  If there were more than another party on the physical layer which needed to be addressed, then a networking layer would be required.  Many of the modern protocols using Ethernet would include this layer as we will see in later blog posts.

The HOST Layers

The host layers consist of protocols which apply to the host.  In our case the 'host' on each end is a person, and so much of what is described here is within the context of the individual but represents the layering effect of the communication pretty well.

Layer 4 - Transport

The transport layer is representing how the communication takes place.  We have established above that the actual communication between Mary and Gerry consists of sound waves somehow converted to vibration on a red string, however the actual communications is in terms of a language which both parties or both 'hosts' can understand.  The transport layer then demands that the communication be in the audio spectrum and consists of 'words' which when arranged in sequence will convey meaning, and a set of 'flow control' items which allow both hosts to control the conversation and therefore communicate.

We can well imagine the difficulties of flow control, since we assume the 'hosts' have to use the protocol stack to control the flow of conversation. They might choose something simple, like a whistle which when blown could indicate either that they wish to start or end a conversation, or they might use the word 'over' to indicate that he or she has finished talking and now waiting for a response.

Flow control then helps 'host's decide which host gets access to the 'wire' to transmit and when.

Layer 5 - Session

This layer refers to the fact that Mary and Gerry have established a session or time during which they will communicate using say for example the 'English language' over a string-can telephone circuit and both are parties to that conversation at the same time.  From Mary's point of view, it is a conversation between Gerry and I.  From Gerry's point of view it is a conversation between Mary and I.

Layer 6 - Presentation

The presentation layer is probably one of the most interesting and really represents the point where each 'host' can apply it's own personality to the communication.  In this case the presentation layer is taking the idiom of the other speaker and translating it to the local idiom of the listener.  Although Irish and American English is similar, there are enough differences to have to force each 'host' to do some translation of meaning and encoding of communications so that the other can understand.  In digital protocols, particularly where a level of syntax is expected, the Basic Encoding Rules or BER would sit at this layer.

Layer 7 - Application

Now we really don't know what is going on at the application layer inside Mary and Gerry's head other than thoughts and discussion continue to some conclusion.  This conclusion may be determined prior to or during the call, and may depend on topic's covered in the call.  The important point about the application layer is that it represents the point of connection between COMMUNICATION as an activity and other activities which will take place within the host.

In subsequent post's this month, I will talk over some of the protocols which we use in our SCADA systems, their importance, key features, and give an idea of how they work and why use them and where. Our SCADA products would in many cases use one or more protocols as part of a system integration or system solution in remote locations.

Once again if you wish to help improve this posting by meaningful experiences, please feel free to comment.  It's all part of the protocol so to speak.

Chris Smith
[Sydney, Australia - April 2012]





Feature Photo - Attribution - F Decomite [Flickr] creative commons licence.
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Postcard from Boston - Sydney Calling

Sun and Rain as I wandered around Harvard Square, taking the T from South Station the morning after the long flight.  A week ago now. Tomorrow evening I will begin the long journey home again. I will send the actual postcard back home to Sydney, and have had a request to send postcards back when I get home as well. I remember the oysters and Rapscallion beer. It seemed an excellent combo to shake off the jet-lag.

Modernizing the XY Controller with a 3rd Turtle

Last week I discussed the application specific space saving application of the XY controller.  When having to modernize these, not only do we have to work with the specific constraints of the hardware - [see last weeks post] - but also the fact that at the same time, we might have to jump 40 years in technology.

In this post I extend the conjectured modernization by considering the modernization of an 20th century item of plant control to the 21st century use of lets say semantic technology.  For this example being substation oriented, we should consider going from the Master Slave relay logic direct to it's representation as an IEC 61850 object publication and control. This is not a post about IEC 61850 specifically, but uses that new technology to illustrate the point relating to modernization and re-integration of older technology into the new semantic type technology.

If you have read this far, you might want to know why does that matter ?  I will try to keep to the point in less than 600 words, and the graphic may help, but please read to the end, think for a few minutes and make any comment about modernization you feel relevant.

The Space Saving XY Controller

XY Controller Decoding Matrix

I recently had to revisit an older control application, where the customer wanted to keep everything the same, but replace his older remote terminal unit technology with perhaps a newer one, yet keep the existing wiring and functionality. With some of the older equipment the limitations of space, both physical, and in terms of protocol address space, meant that engineering remote control solutions often meant optimization of space at the expense of urgency and time. The challenge in modernization almost always starts with No change in SPACE, no change in WIRING, and ends in trying to exchange modern high tech equipment into the same cabinets and racks which the older equipment occupies.

Operational Metasystem Transitions

A view of the operational spaces

In my last post we saw the influence of the rapid rise of AI on playing chess, and you might have drawn the connection with online chess games, now using the AI engines for online chess playing.
In this blog post I segment the operational space into a convenient metasystem 'model' to first define a set of operational levels and then layout so of their features and attributes.

Control Systems beyond Deep Blue

It's only Human 
my faithful Machine Interface
to want to move to a more collaborative scene
I've seen 'a space odyssey' and it's memorable dream
where HAL the ship computer didn't know what we need


and we are beyond the time of Deep Blue


Now, it's our collective tactical crush
which makes us take hold of a wii
and swing it around
in total control
virtually

We are entering a phase where the HMI will become somewhat subservient in ways we don't yet understand to a higher level of computational interaction. This month we explore on this blog, aspects of the Operational Interface, and the transition to more collaborative technology.

SCADA is Elephants and Turtles all the way down

We had just moved some of our SCADA engineering to the Invensys facility in West Durrington, Worthing, UK. Worthing is down by the beach not far west of Brighton on the English channel. Not far from Worthing, if you go up past Arundel, is Goodwood, the home of the famous racing circuit among other things.  I found the Cass Sculpture park there and wandering around on a weekend. I stumbled across Tony Cragg's public sculpture. I like this one in particular for it's topology, and for today's post I think it relevant in the discussion on the general form of SCADA systems. This post includes a Turchin style dialog on SCADA, what is it and what does it mean. It also includes a general discussion on metasystems and holons and how SCADA architectures themselves include aspect of these higher level concepts.  So if you are brave... read on...

Engineering the Semantic Plant

Engineering complex close fitting encapsulated control systems for plants requires the incorporation of a number of data capture and review processes to eliminate the post start up operational risk as early as possible in the project time frame.

While the 'semantic web' continues to take shape with SPARQL and RDP/OWL databases and their definition taking shape in ISO 15926 construction communities, Invensys is building up the core tools, templates, rules bases and workbench processes to take on larger and larger plant designs in collaboration with it's customers.

Reflected Doyle Spirals - F Decomite [Flickr] [ CC ]

The Doyle Spiral as depicted in Reflected Doyle Spirals beautifully traces the packing of ever increasing circle size in sets of interlocking coloured spirals. These sets have aspects of encapsulation, increasing scale, close fitting components and simple recursive rules to define their behaviour. It is my view that engineering highly scalar control and safety systems follows similar structures, and as such, we might keep in mind how best to frame the close fitting data exchanges between different companies and engineering teams in order to make them equally elegant.

Universal IO - Then end of the Marshalling Panel

Ever since the ability to quickly compute and the creation of electronic configurations, we've seen companies struggle with trying to quickly develop consistent configurations from a top down logical design basis.  The advent of object oriented systems has enabled configuration to be partitioned in uniquely named environments.  If only the real world would comply with the lovely abstract designs we have on the computer screen.

Engineering : The Industrial and Social Revolution

National Railway Museum - York, UK

It's Charles Dickens' anniversary, he the great novelist whose commentary on the social state in the industrial revolution, might have been interested to see how science and engineering turned out 112 years hence his famous novel about the industrial revolution.

With the huge development of the social networking jungle out their, I am pleased to see how engineers worldwide are adapting professional discussion groups to maintain a healthy interest in the development of Engineering Standards. How engineering itself has changed since its first real convocation during the Industrial Revolution where locomotives are named after the King, through to the Social Revolution.....

On Graphics and Indication in Unit Control

Fundamentally an operator interacts with an equipment based automation control system by means of a touch panel, push-buttons, panel alarms, lights, hooters and at least one key graphic display.

Today I am in the Worthing, UK, home of Invensys Eurotherm and had an opportunity to talk with some of the Senior Engineers and think about the life of an plant operator and the use of these devices. As a result I decided to focus this post on three aspects:-

• Hands-Free Indication
• Primary Panel Graphics
• State of Play Indication

All three aspects need to be taken into consideration in the implementation of packaged control solutions.

Postcard from Shanghai

  


Xin Nian Kuai Le ! - Happy New Year ! - From Shanghai

 Dear blog readers,

This week I was fortunate to spend some time with my 'lao pengyou' old friends at the Invensys Facility in Shanghai.

Our Electric Power SCADA RTU product, the SCD5200 / RTU50 is manufactured at the Invensys - Shanghai Foxboro Company Ltd., and it was timely to visit there this week. That is just prior to the 10 day spring festival which starts with Chinese New Year. Much of the Foxboro product is manufactured in Shanghai and has been for the past 40 years or so.  Times have changed, and the factory has recently moved out to the new facility at Feng Pu industrial park, Feng Xian south of Shanghai. There is still a photo of President Reagan opening the original facility in Cao Bao Lu when China first started opening up to the west.

This coming Year of the Dragon promises to be an exciting time for China, and for Invensys as well. Many of the Nuclear Power projects in China will be using our Invensys Systems technology and Nuclear expertise. If you would like to read more on this topic  refer : Invensys Wins Nuclear Project in China.

Thanks so much to the team in Invensys Shanghai for making me feel so welcome ! 

Best Regards

Chris Smith
[Shanghai, China]
The photo of me was taken by one of my esteemed colleagues at one of the new shopping centres in XuJiaHui, Shanghai



The ART of the TABLET GESTURE

I just can't wait for the day that I am strapped ultra fast into my sports tourer, and driving with a dashboard of touch screens in front of me.  I like to use both hands sometimes, but lets assume I can drive with one hand. No ! - one finger using the latest Touch technology of gestures.  No steering wheel or foot pedals, just a touch screen. Bit frightening perhaps... but definitely possible.

Visual Layout Aspects of Remote Control Consoles

I've watched 'Pearl Harbour'..


I've experienced 'Das Boot'..


.. a great 80's movie about the sinking of a U Boat.  These films capture the emotion of men of action under pressure.  Under pressure, the sub's captain on the bridge and engine people have to make some hard decisions fast about how to maneuver the submarine and stay out of trouble. This post takes a look at the control panel layout in the maneuver room, and picks out some of the salient features for taking ACTION under PRESSURE.

Invensys SCADA Blog Calendar 2012

Dear readers,

Summer has arrived here in Sydney, finally, after all  the fireworks on New Years's Eve, and now we have  the Sydney Festival starting this weekend.




Just to keep everyone posted, so to speak,  I put together today a short calendar for the year 2012....