HMI Custom Reports

All,

I have a lot of requirement for customers wanting reporting from our equipment. Currently we generate reports from the PLC using its serial port. However, this is becoming problematic for many reasons.

Ideally, I would like to have a customizable report builder in the HMI that I could populate with tags. It would be great if these reports could be sent to compactflash or other electronic media as well as to a USB printer. And I would prefer that it not be a screen shot print.

Anyone have any experience with this? The HMI would need to be able to communicate well with A/B Logix platform.

FYI, I have been asking all my A/B contacts to add this to the Panelview Plus line but feel like I'm beating my head against a wall.

Thanks,
Mark

The Red Lion G3 can do most of what you ask with it's built in logging features. To make the reports customizable at run time might require a bit of extra scripting in the unit, but we'd have to know more about what you mean.

Sorry.. I should have clarified.. Not customizable at run time.

I believe it was a Siemens OP style panel I used years ago that basically had a blank page where you could add tags to make a report and print that report when it was called. The report could also be larger than the size of the display, which was critical.

Many Options

There are many options for what you want to do. I guess the first thing to ask is what are you using for the HMI?

Most of the options will require you to have the ability to write code in VB. VB scripting allows you to create reports in several ways.

1) You capture the data in the tags and create a snapshot of that data and create a text document to print it when an event occurs. This is probably similar to what you are doing with the serial port at the moment. This is only a snapshot of that particular instance.

2) Install a local database such as MS Access which will allow you to log the data to a database and store that information. This give you the ability to create custom reports and save them. Much more flexiblity and customization for the customer.

3) Use a remote server that could already be in place such as MS Sql or MySql. The benefits are the same as a local server but a little more complicated as far as logging the information but not a lot.

I am sure that there will be more ideas from others that have done this.

Hope that helps.

Gene

Gene,

Thanks for the reply. The problem is my current HMI is a Panelview Plus which cannot do what I'm asking. I'm looking for options on a new one. Preferably not a full blown PC because that introduces many other issues.

When called for by the customer, I have a FactoryTalk View SE application that uses a MS SQL database similar to what you are suggesting. But that option it too complicated for most of my customers.

My platform is Allen Bradley, I´ve been using XLReporter from www.sytech.com for more the 6 years, You have to use rslinx as an OPC server and Excel as an OPC client (thru XLReporter) and that´s all you need. Your can try it free, it works for two hours.

It takes me about 15 seconds to add tags to a Datalog on my G306 (including the two seconds it take sto start Crimson 3.0 and open a recent file), and another 10 seconds to download and restart it over ethernet. It is currently communicating with a Compactlogix PLC and a SLC 5/04 via net-eni module.

I think the G3 is more than capable of doing what you want to do. The software is free and very good, but it is much different than FTView Studio, so there is a bit of a learning curve.

I'm not concerned about learning new software. It's my job right?

The G3 series does look interesting. Thank you for the information.

Red Lion can do it with ease

In the Red Lion you can generate 2 types of reports pretty easy. One is the event report the other is the data log. Both work as there names imply. Also the G3 has a built in Web Server so you can access these logs via the ethernet. Scripting comes in when you want a specific log at a specific time and you want to give that log a certain name (like shift roeport...etc). Also on the data logs you can do what is called a batching function that allows you to group your logs under a certain batch group.

The script you would be working in is a kissing cousin to C++. In fact I got a book for C++ and this help with understanding what I was doing writing programs for Red Lion. Their reference manual is real good at describing what their custom object do and how to use them. The manual is included with the C3 software under the help menu.

After downloading the software, I see the G3 series does have some very interesting and useful features that I could use.

However, one downfall that I see right away is there is no support for USB printing I know I shouldn't expect one device to have everything but that sure would be nice. Our equipment is generally standalone so it won't have a network interface for doing Web Server reports.

Mark,

I would encourage you to look at InduSoft Web Studio (Full disclosure ...I work for InduSoft). IWS provides communication drivers for the AB PLCs, built-in reporting functionality supporting various formats, as well as tools for communciation with any SQL compliant database. Additionally, you can deploy your applications on the Windows desktop/server operating systems, as well as embedded operating systems giving you a lot of flexibility in selecting your hardware platform.

Best of all, you can download a free evaluation copy of the software at the following link: http://www.indusoft.com/download_products.asp

BHow
InduSoft, Inc.

Have you looked at the new PV+ 6? It does also logging of data to self or to a ODBC link and does allow viewing of screen on a browser.