Proxy Configuration for Industrial Devices via HMI Mediator
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Solution Overview
Problem
Many industrial devices, including human machine interfaces (HMIs), lack the capability to interact with configuration stations, limiting their programmability and flexibility due to cost and resource constraints, such as limited software and memory.
Innovation Solution
A technique for proxy configuration, where a server-enabled HMI establishes a link with the device to be configured, generates a configuration file, and transmits it to a configuration station, allowing changes to be made and then retransmitted back to the device, enabling configuration without requiring the device to serve a design environment or enumerate properties.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If industrial devices are equipped with on-board configuration capabilities to interact directly with configuration stations, then programmability and flexibility are improved, but device complexity, software overhead, and cost increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces an intermediary HMI device that acts as a mediator between the configuration station and the industrial device. The HMI device with configuration capabilities communicates with the target device, allowing the target device to be configured without having its own configuration server or design environment. This resolves the contradiction by enabling programmability through the intermediary while keeping the target device simple and cost-effective.
2Adaptability or versatility
If industrial devices are equipped with on-board configuration capabilities to interact directly with configuration stations, then programmability and flexibility are improved, but device cost increases
Solution Approach 1:
The HMI device serves as a cost-effective intermediary that provides configuration capabilities externally. Instead of embedding expensive configuration servers, design environments, and software stacks in every industrial device, the system uses a shared HMI device to perform configuration functions, significantly reducing the bill of materials and manufacturing cost of individual devices.
Solution Approach 2:
The HMI device is designed to be universal and multi-functional, serving both as an operational interface and as a configuration station intermediary. This multi-functionality allows a single device to replace multiple specialized components, reducing overall system cost while maintaining programmability of the industrial device.
3Adaptability or versatility
If industrial devices are equipped with on-board configuration capabilities, then configuration flexibility is improved, but memory requirements and resource consumption increase
Solution Approach 1:
The HMI intermediary device hosts the configuration server and design environment in its own memory space, eliminating the need for the target industrial device to allocate significant memory for configuration functions. The target device only needs minimal memory to communicate configuration parameters, preserving configuration flexibility while drastically reducing memory requirements.
4Ease of manufacture
If industrial devices lack configuration capabilities, then device complexity and cost are reduced, but programmability and flexibility are limited
Solution Approach 1:
The patent resolves this contradiction by introducing an external HMI intermediary that provides configuration capabilities to simple, low-cost industrial devices. The devices themselves remain simple and cost-effective, while the HMI intermediary enables full programmability and flexibility through proxy configuration, allowing both goals to be achieved simultaneously.
Data Source
AI summary
An electrical device may be configured by coupling the device to a human machine interface (HMI) that is equipped with software for interacting with a configuration station. The software may include components that can enumerate properties of objects on the device to be configured. The device to be configured provides a file to the server-enabled HMI, such as a schema file. The server-enabled HMI then enumerates properties of the objects or otherwise provides an indication of the properties to the configuration station. The properties may be altered by a user at the configuration station. The reconfigured properties are then transmitted from the server-enabled HMI back to the device to be configured.