Inductive Automation ICC 2017 News

I spent this week at the Ignition Community Conference thought I'd share some news.

1 - Ignition v8.0 was announced, but not for release until next year (Probably ICC 2018). Due to the major updates they are doing. These include:

- Ignition Perspective, HTML5 based visualization! Mobile is getting the attention it needs! (Note, this is not Vision module 2.0)
- Tag system is getting updated, look for speed improvements, better management
- Version Control features

Other features I'm sure, it was a very general information of what they are targeting in that release, and sounds like a substantial update.

2 - MES (Sepasoft) has updated to OEE 2.0, substantial changes to how you can develop OEE items, improves the alignment with ISA 95.

3 - BATCH! Yes Batching is coming! Sepasoft did not put an official timeframe for the release of Batch but it's coming, I hope this will officially released by ICC 2018.

Some other notable features, v7.9.4 has added "Named Queries" as a feature. Easily create parameterized DB queries in one place and reuse in the project. Should reduce the need for scripting to retrieve data. I'll be looking closer at this next week.

Security, it was a big topic this week and expect to see the impact on v8.0, starting off with the default admin/password credentials being removed as default.

You should be seeing a new Load Balancing module. This will manage the Client loads across multiple Vision Gateway servers. I'm very impressed with some of the architectures being built on this platform. Multiple IO Servers, Multiple Vision Gateways, Multiple historian/SQL transaction servers and redundancy! These architectures are huge, reaching 400+ clients and more than 1 million+ tags! With the Enterprise Administration Module and Gateway network managing everything.

If you're having any tag response issues, move to the latest version of v7.9 and be sure you are using UDTs!!

They shared a video of the renovation process on the building they purchased for their new head quarters, it's impressive! I believe it is 56,000 sq ft. Should be a nice tour for next year.

All-in-all good stuff as I've come to expect. Hopefully I'll be able to attend 2018!

Nice write up.

I have been an ICC regular since since inception. Did not go this year as it has now become 'the same old same old'. Last year they talked about V8.0 being released at ICC 2017.

Other than a good time in Cali, the opportunity to rent a bike , it appears I did not miss much this year by not attending.

curlyandshemp said:

I have been an ICC regular since since inception. Did not go this year as it has now become 'the same old same old'.

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I can see how it can be repetitive. Last time I was there was 2014 so it was nice to get reconnected with some people. MQTT/IIoT was the buzz as it is everywhere else. Will be interesting to see that technology evolve and adapted in industry.

This was the first time I did the workshops, those were hit and miss. It's nice to see community members presenting projects and hosting workshops, but most of the time the presentations are pretty dry and some downright boring. Classic death by power point...

Something I failed to mention is the announcement of "Ignition Onboard", basically hardware canned with Ignition. They had some examples that seemed like it would be a nice convenience.

2 years ago that was a presenter with a 'brick' PC imbedded with Ignition. Again, nothing new.
Other than a good time to get away, there really is nothing new and innovative.