Self-Configuring Embedded Historians for Industrial Data Exchange
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional industrial control systems lack a seamless mechanism for data exchange between various components of an enterprise, making it difficult to collect, analyze, and optimize real-time data from global manufacturing sites, and they are not equipped to handle data recording and storage requirements for compliance with regulations like 21 CFR Part 11 efficiently.
Innovation Solution
The introduction of a configuration component that automatically configures and propagates settings for embedded historians, providing a direct interface to controllers without a transitional layer, enabling efficient data exchange and security management across an industrial network, and employing a locator component to detect and configure embedded historians within a hierarchical organizational model.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of manufacture
If manual configuration of historians is used, then configuration can be done with basic tools, but it is error-prone and time-consuming
Solution Approach 1:
The system enables self-service configuration through automatic discovery mechanisms. The historian automatically discovers controllers and I/O devices on the network, retrieves their configurations, and populates the configuration interface without requiring manual intervention. This eliminates manual configuration errors and significantly reduces configuration time while maintaining ease of use.
Solution Approach 2:
The system performs preliminary actions by pre-configuring communication protocols and data structures before the actual configuration process. The automatic discovery mechanism pre-identifies all controllers and devices, pre-retrieves their configurations, and pre-validates data integrity, so that the final configuration step is rapid and error-free.
2Reliability
If PC-Historian with transitional layer is used, then data storage and retrieval is provided, but data exchange rate is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The invention extracts and eliminates the transitional layer from the data path between controllers and historians. By establishing direct communication channels, the system removes the intermediate processing step that caused data exchange delays, while maintaining the reliable storage and retrieval capabilities of the historian through optimized direct access protocols.
Solution Approach 2:
The system segments the data exchange architecture into direct point-to-point connections between historians and controllers, eliminating the monolithic transitional layer. This segmentation allows for optimized communication paths for different data types and improves overall data exchange speed while maintaining storage reliability.
3Reliability
If conventional control systems architecture is used, then controller operation is maintained, but seamless data exchange between enterprise components is not enabled
Solution Approach 1:
The system implements a universal data exchange platform that enables historians to communicate with multiple types of controllers and enterprise components through standardized protocols. This multi-functional approach allows seamless data exchange across diverse systems while maintaining the reliability of individual controller operations through isolated communication channels.
Solution Approach 2:
The invention introduces an intermediary configuration system that mediates between conventional controllers and enterprise data components. This intermediary automatically discovers controllers, standardizes their data interfaces, and enables seamless integration with enterprise components without modifying the controllers themselves, thus maintaining operational reliability while enhancing data exchange capability.
4Adaptability or versatility
If manual configuration propagation between historians is used, then configuration can be shared, but errors propagate and configuration is time-consuming
Solution Approach 1:
The system implements feedback mechanisms that automatically validate configuration data before propagation. When configuration changes are made to one historian, the system automatically verifies data integrity, checks for conflicts, and only propagates validated configurations to other historians. This feedback loop prevents error propagation while maintaining configuration sharing capabilities.
Solution Approach 2:
The configuration propagation system operates autonomously by automatically discovering which historians need configuration updates, retrieving the latest validated configurations, and propagating them across the network without manual intervention. This self-service approach ensures configuration accuracy is maintained while enabling widespread configuration sharing.
Data Source
AI summary
Systems and methods that configure an embedded historian(s) to a predetermined setting and an automatic propagation thereof to other embedded historians and units on the factory floor. Embedded historian can be automatically configured, and be set up as a default collection for a plant scan, such that when a plant comes on-line, embedded historians announce their presence to such plant, and are discovered thereby and configured thereby.