MAG8000 OPC Server to SCADA communication

Hi,

I am executing one of the order for 45 numbers of MAG8000 Flow Meters with GSM Module in one of our Water Networking Project. I have installed MAG8000 OPC Server on 2 locations in Central Station where GE Fanuc SCADA and Siemens WinCC is already existing. In order to communicate between Flow Meter and OPC server we need to configure emails on flow meter as well as on OPC server. Then CSV file in email attachment will be sent from flow meter to OPC server once a day. These data will be polled by OPC server as Historical Data per flow meter with time stamping. Till here I am sure I’ll be able to complete the task.

My main concern came when client asked me to communicate between MAG8000 OPC Server with Siemens WINCC SACDA and MAG8000 OPC Server with GE SCADA. Do you have any instruction manual to make a communication between SCADA to OPC? Or Any suggestions for this?

Regards,

By definition, OPC servers talk to OPC clients and vice versa.

HMI and SCADA software are typically OPC clients, so WinCC and the GE Fanuc SCADA software are likely OPC clients already. I say 'likely' because OPC client functionality was optional on some older software.

OPC Clients typically search automatically for OPC servers so once an OPC server is installed it will show up in the OPC client's list of available OPC servers.

The Mag8000 manual mentions OPC DA and OPC HDA:
"OPC client can retrieve data either in the format of OPC HDA data (several data sets) or OPC
DA format (only the latest data set)"

That's only partially true, many older OPC versions supported only OPC DA (DA stands for Data Acquistion, point-by-point in real time) because it was the first version of OPC. HDA is Historical Data Access (if I remember rightly) and enables block transfer of multiple data points with all the attendant issues of data and table formatting.

Another disguised warning is in the comment, "Once the application has been run, a shortcut is placed in the startup list. The application starts automatically on logon in order to receive data from the MAG 8000 devices."

That fails to spell out the power failure issue with software that runs as an application. If the PC on which the OPC server runs is on a domain, it will require a user to log-in after a power failure. Since the MAG8000 OPC server runs as an application, it will not run until someone logs in after a power failure, the start-up folder is not accessed until after a user logs in. The HMI and SCADA software programs typically run as a service, not an application, because a service runs before any user logs in; a service does not require a log-in.

Another issue might be in the warning "it is necessary to activate POP3 access before the POP3 protocol can be used. Corporate firewalls might block POP3 traffic."

New question published by MDaskalakis is split to a separate thread with the subject MAG 800 flow meters with GSM/GPRS comm card, where the sqlite database files are.

Best regards
Min_Moderator

New question published by pmorte79 is split to a separate thread with the subject MAG8000 OPC server and Windows 8.

Best regards
CS Moderator