R
The OPC foundation has, in the past, done a reasonable job of 'upping the level' of industrial control interfaces, providing a standard API that is suitable for use by people who are 'above' the device level (production management, quality control etc.). But the OPC standards have many shortcomings. It was originally designed as an API between application and low level device interface, not as a site wide intercommunication protocol. The use of DCOM has allowed it to take on the latter role, albeit with many shortcomings. OPC promised to produce new specifications based on XML that would be more suitable for site/enterprise wide system integration as far back as 1999.
Other organisations have also worked on open protocols for industrial system integration. Some of these of never got out of thier niche markets whilst others seemed to give up in the face of the widespread diffusion of OPC, which is very well supported by both automation manufacturers and third party automation software developers. One competing standard that looked promising was MIMOSA. This had started out by defining database standards and hence SQL interfaces, and like OPC migrated to XML as a concept for improving the interface.
OPC had orginally touted a lot of features, and initially seemed very keen on making some sort of biztalk compliant interface (which worried a lot of us as it did not seemed to be the right sort of interface!). Latterly they have only talked about SOAP. They also talked with MIMOSA and decided to work together on a compatible XML standard. Things were looking positive.
But all that was 2 years ago. Deadlines have come and gone. Announcements have floated by, and in the meantime the actual information available appears to be getting less. In fact the previously published MIMOSA standards have now been made secrect, clearly thier collaboration with OPC has had some effect!
In the meantime we the users are still holding our breath. COM and DCOM are officially passe, but we do not know how or where to invest our time and money in order to go forward! From the information I have managed to extract here and there it would seem that OPC and MIMOSA decided that they had such a mess between them that the needed to start from scratch and produce something sweet and simple, as it should be. Hence also the secrecy, they did not want snippets of the original work to get out as they were allready working on something completely different. Unfortunatly it would seem that 'XML2' has also suffered from comittee bloat and run off the rails as well.
The, out of the blue, arrives IDA (www.ida-group.org). They have come apparently from nowhere with a first rate common sense standard proposal. The basic concept appears to be that of taking the IETF proposed Modbus TCP/IP standard and 'describing' the interfaces with XML, i.e. levering existing technology and standards and making it available in an easy and palatable form to people at an EDP level. That is probably too much a simplification. IDA standards, like OPC, can conceive any underlying transport such as CAN and Profibus, but the higher level interface is defined in a clear simple and concise manner. And it is freely available for download.
So, I thought this might make a good topic of discussion for this group (which has a notorious reputation for heated discussion on comms protocols). Does the IDA group have a chance of filling the void left by the OPC/MIMOSA failure to deliver, or is the OPC on the verge of releasing a world shattering super flexible protocol?
Other organisations have also worked on open protocols for industrial system integration. Some of these of never got out of thier niche markets whilst others seemed to give up in the face of the widespread diffusion of OPC, which is very well supported by both automation manufacturers and third party automation software developers. One competing standard that looked promising was MIMOSA. This had started out by defining database standards and hence SQL interfaces, and like OPC migrated to XML as a concept for improving the interface.
OPC had orginally touted a lot of features, and initially seemed very keen on making some sort of biztalk compliant interface (which worried a lot of us as it did not seemed to be the right sort of interface!). Latterly they have only talked about SOAP. They also talked with MIMOSA and decided to work together on a compatible XML standard. Things were looking positive.
But all that was 2 years ago. Deadlines have come and gone. Announcements have floated by, and in the meantime the actual information available appears to be getting less. In fact the previously published MIMOSA standards have now been made secrect, clearly thier collaboration with OPC has had some effect!
In the meantime we the users are still holding our breath. COM and DCOM are officially passe, but we do not know how or where to invest our time and money in order to go forward! From the information I have managed to extract here and there it would seem that OPC and MIMOSA decided that they had such a mess between them that the needed to start from scratch and produce something sweet and simple, as it should be. Hence also the secrecy, they did not want snippets of the original work to get out as they were allready working on something completely different. Unfortunatly it would seem that 'XML2' has also suffered from comittee bloat and run off the rails as well.
The, out of the blue, arrives IDA (www.ida-group.org). They have come apparently from nowhere with a first rate common sense standard proposal. The basic concept appears to be that of taking the IETF proposed Modbus TCP/IP standard and 'describing' the interfaces with XML, i.e. levering existing technology and standards and making it available in an easy and palatable form to people at an EDP level. That is probably too much a simplification. IDA standards, like OPC, can conceive any underlying transport such as CAN and Profibus, but the higher level interface is defined in a clear simple and concise manner. And it is freely available for download.
So, I thought this might make a good topic of discussion for this group (which has a notorious reputation for heated discussion on comms protocols). Does the IDA group have a chance of filling the void left by the OPC/MIMOSA failure to deliver, or is the OPC on the verge of releasing a world shattering super flexible protocol?