Should there be a minimum internaltional standard for PLC programmers?

Peter Nachtwey

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Peter Nachtwey
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Apr 2002
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Yes or now and if yes what would you include or test for as a minimum standard?

I can think of things like
DeMorgan's theorem
Karnaugh maps - Remember Terry Wood? I met him once.
Scaling, rise over run. High school math.
Bit hacks.

The reason I post this is that I have been on this forum for over 20 years now and I see the same questions over and over again. It really surprises me, well not really any more, when noobs think they are the first to be challenged by a basic problem that has been solved decades ago and they are too lazy to do a internet search first.
 
Me too @DRBB, the amount of times posters are looking for manuals etc. & a quick search comes up with a couple of million hits, TBH, I don't think any minimum standard or exam based qualification will make any difference, it will still happen, the times I have helped people who could be considered quite fluent in programming & for some reason seem to have this aversion to research, on the other hand, I have also come across people who are well qualified in programming in other languages, one example is a guy who had designed hardware & written software for a high speed colour sorter machine, not a simple task by any means, his resume was impeccable, the one thing that really surprised me when working with him was his real lack of understanding of simple PLC ladder, one of his comments was "This PLC programming seems out of my league", this astounded me to say the least.
 
I must be in a trouble making mood, but something struck me. We have been discussing vaccination in another thread and we talked about personal freedom. Seat belt law was mentioned and how it impinges on personal freedom. But here we have a thread about governments limiting who can program PLCs, be careful what you say 'yes' to.

Now, a law about minimum training before you are allowed to have children is something I could really get behind. :ROFLMAO:
 
BryanG said:
But here we have a thread about governments limiting who can program PLCs, be careful what you say 'yes' to.
Click to expand...
Does not the government already regulate who can wire houses, perform surgeries, argue cases for others, &c?
 
I think this would be hard to regulate for the following reason:


For an electrician/surgeon etc, there is usually only a small number of correct ways to perform a particular task, or correct a problem. There are only so many options to do things to "code" in those types of trades/professions.


For a programmer, there are many, many ways to solve a particular problem, all of which can be perfectly fine in terms of performance. How do you regulate something like that?



There's only one correct answer to which wire gauge is correct for an application, and only one correct method to do certain surgeries, but for programmers there are many options in terms of how to solve their problem. Just my 2c
 
Licensure for engineers has been around for decades. I've been a licensed Professional Engineer since 1976. The ISA has certification programs too, but I don't know much about them. https://www.isa.org/certification

Based on the types of questions seen here and my experiences teaching instrumentation courses for the University of Wisconsin's Department of Engineering Professional Development most of the material should be covering the things outside the control panel.

Types of instruments and their operating principles (level, pressure, flow, etc.)
2- 3- and 4- wire instruments
Motor and motor control fundamentals
VFDs
Scaling signals
Communication fundamentals
How a PLC scans logic
DCS vs PLC vs hard-wired controls
 

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