Created Date: September 19,2018

Created by: K_For_Potassium

Hello,

Trying to determine what PLC to pair with a c-more HMI. I liked the programming features of the do-more series, so that's what I'm leaning towards over the productivity line. I need a way to retrieve log files automatically - the PLC won't have network access, so e-mail won't be an option. However, there will be a PC that can bridge the PLC network to our LAN. I was hoping to use this PC to use FTP or similar on a schedule to pull all files -- as long as FTP/HTTP or similar is an option, I can easily write a script to download the log files at whatever interval we need. I know the productivity series has the web view where you can access files from the SD card, does BRX offer the same?

Thanks!

Created Date: September 20,2018

Created by: BobO

Not allowed by IT for many reasons (which I agree with)

I'll take that as no web access on the BRX like the productivity suite?

I fully understand why you want factory processes air gapped, but if the PC is already LAN connected, I'm not sure I understand how web access is any different than a local mail server or relay.

The short answer is no, there is no web access, in part for the same reasons as your IT guys. You can access log files via DmD. You can use the DMLogger device to log directly to the PC. You can use MQTT to generate logs elsewhere. You can write your own web service with custom protocol instructions (it's been done). And coming later this year, you can use HTTP(S) based REST APIs to access databases to create logs. But no web access to the files.

Created Date: September 20,2018

Created by: K_For_Potassium

Thanks, BobO. I appreciate your help!

IT does not support anything not provided/setup by them nor anything that we buy/setup for production. I can setup a mail server on our production LAN all I want - I have no problem doing this personally, as I have decades of experience in many realms of IT. I just don't want to setup something that only I can troubleshoot/maintain and leave them stuck when I leave or get hit by a bus. The bridge PC would grab the log files, generate charts in excel files for each batch, then backup the logs and excel files to a network drive. I guess the solution for me is to go with productivity 2000 or 3000 and do a little extra work with the programming.

At least I can look at the BRX again for future projects when the API option is available.

Thanks again!

Created Date: September 20,2018

Created by: BobO

I guess we 're gonna have to suck it up and get a simple web interface on there to access the file systems. With limited sessions and limited functions, it wouldn't be that bad from a security or implementation perspective, but our original vision was much more elaborate. In Host tradition, we set standards for ourselves well beyond what our users generally want or need, and then because we don't feel like we have resources to do what we want (rather than what customers want), we don't do anything at all. Kinda dumb.

As an example, the Do-more engine is capable of function calls with parameter passing and local data, and because we wanted to support all of that for subroutines, we refused to do subroutines until we could do it "right ". It finally occurred to us that users could benefit from a much simpler implementation that would be easy to develop, so we went ahead and added it. We still want to finish the original plan, but that doesn't prevent folks from benefiting today. A web service could be the same. Simple now, cool later.

If any of y 'all would like to comment on what you'd like a Do-more sourced web service to offer, I'd love to hear it.