by Gary Mintchell | Feb 21, 2019 | Podcast, Standards
I’ve added a new podcast–184 Standards are Important for Manufacturers. Without standards, shipping by ship, train, and truck would be chaotic. Just so, developing manufacturing standards such as OPC, FDT, EDDL, ISA88, and ISA95 has had great benefit to manufacturers and producers. The Open Process Automation Forum, part of The Open Group, consists of users and developers of technology hoping to build a standard of standards lowering total cost of ownership and total cost of upgrading.
by Gary Mintchell | Feb 20, 2019 | Automation, Operator Interface, Workforce
My thesis holds that the proper development and deployment of technology empowers workers to better perform their tasks. The keywords from my interview with Webalo at the ARC Industry Forum in Orlando were “empower” and “tool”.
The conversations centered on the company’s launch of Webalo 5.0, the latest version of its no-code, frontline workforce app generation platform. Its User First approach automatically generates and personalizes apps from enterprise data sources, such those from IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, and SAP as well as industrial data sources such as AVEVA, GE, Rockwell, and Siemens.
Webalo enables frontline workers through real-time access to actionable analytics, alerts, and notifications, as well as desktop and native mobile bi-directional interaction through intelligently managed workflows.
“Though the overwhelming majority of companies understand that frontline worker autonomy would boost their competitiveness, less than 30% of companies have been able to launch frontline workforce digital transformation projects because of the time, cost and complexity of traditional software development approaches,”said Webalo CEO Peter Price. “Webalo 5.0 automates the digital transformation of the frontline workforce at a fraction of the time, cost and effort of these traditional approaches, providing frontline workerswithreal-time, actionable,personalizedvisibility into their daily tasks and activities.”
Webalo 5.0’s specific features include:
- Tighter integration with industrial data sources such as Historian databases and Manufacturing Execution Systems(MES).
- Powerful “Connect & Deploy”–a no-code app delivery capabilitythat providesend users with the ability to easily generate new applications in an ad hoc, drag and drop manner, directly from their Webalo Desktop Client.
- Actionable visualizations are now defined at the individual user level, providing frontline workers with the flexibility to create their own custom views of apps and share them with their co-workers.
- Enhanced workflow management empowersfrontline workers in a more intelligent way,with multiple visualizations of the same task using different parameters.
- Automatically-generated tasks and actionable visualizations to operate over MES asset hierarchies and Historian tags that makes the data more actionable and visible to all stakeholders.
- Contextualized dashboards that provide embedded asset hierarchy, selectable timeframes and custom user inputs.
- User-managed editors to create and modify trend charts,with out-of-the-box Historian services, allowing frontline workers to modify the way they request and display Historian tag values by selecting a Historian sampling mode from a drop-down menu, and then configuring the options that appear for that node.
- PDF report generation providing a new way of sharing data interactively with co-workers.Webalo 5.0 is now available.
by Gary Mintchell | Feb 19, 2019 | Manufacturing IT, Security
If HMI SCADA absorbed about 40% of my ARC Industry Forum appointments, then industrial cybersecurity took up another 40%. Not all of them were the usual networking solutions, either.
This one, for example, comes from Honeywell. It announced the latest release of Secure Media Exchange (SMX), a cybersecurity solution to protect industrial operators against new and emerging Universal Serial Bus (USB) threats. SMX now includes patent pending capabilities to protect against a broad range of malicious USB device attacks, which disrupt operations through misuse of legitimate USB functions or unauthorized device actions.
These advanced protections complement additional SMX enhancements to malware detection, utilizing machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) to improve detection by up to 40 percent above traditional anti-virus solutions according to a Honeywell study. Together, these updates to the SMX platform deliver comprehensive, enterprise-wide USB protection, visibility and control to meet the demanding physical requirements of industrial environments.
USB devices include flash drives and charging cables, as well as many other USB-attached devices. They represent a primary attack vector into industrial control system (ICS) environments, and existing security controls typically focus on the detection of malware on these USBs.
While important, research shows an emerging trend toward new categories of USB threats that manipulate the capabilities of the device standard to circumvent traditional security controls and directly attack ICS. Categorically, these malicious USB device attacks represent 75 percent of today’s known USB attack types, a clear indication of the shift toward new attack methodologies. Because these attacks can weaponize common USB peripherals — like keyboards, speakers — effective protection requires sophisticated device validation and authorization.
“Malicious USB attacks are increasingly sinister in their ability to emulate, exploit and manipulate USB devices, often causing damage and operational outages,” said Sam Wilson, global product marketing manager, Honeywell Industrial Cybersecurity. “Honeywell is the first to deliver a powerful industrial cybersecurity solution to protect against malicious USB device attacks, which represent the majority of USB threat types and advanced malware. And as USB usage increases and devices proliferate, human verification of device actions will continue to play an important role.”
SMX protection includes Honeywell’s Trusted Response User Substantiation Technology (TRUST), which introduces a human validation and authentication step to ensure that USB devices are what they claim to be. TRUST helps prevent unwanted or suspicious devices from introducing new threats into the industrial control environment. In the case of USB storage devices, additional layers of advanced malware detection technology are used to further protect against malware, including machine learning and AI to improve detection of increasingly complex malware, including zero days and evasive malware.
SMX helps customers make changes across people, process, and technology that will improve their industrial cybersecurity maturity. It trains USB users to look for potential issues as they plug in, while reinforcing plant check-in and check-out processes for plant managers. As a technical control, SMX continuous threat protection and its latest enhancements ensure that customers can check USBs anywhere to scale industrial cybersecurity with ease.
The latest SMX technology release includes a host of additional features including:
- New Centralized Management: provides unmatched visibility of USB devices entering industrial control environments and centralized threat management across all SMX sites, for time-saving security management and simple-to-view insights unique to the customer’s environment.
- New ICS Shield Integration: provides additional visibility into USB activity on protected end nodes, closing the loop between centralized management services and distributed protections inside the ICS, without violating industry best practices of zone segmentation.
- Expanded SMX offering: provides multiple form factors to meet specific industrial needs, including portable SMX ST models for busy operational staff, and fully ruggedized models that meet industrial use cases including hazardous environments, military standard conditions and gloves-on worker situations.
by Gary Mintchell | Feb 15, 2019 | Manufacturing IT, Operations Management, Software
The ARC Industry Forum witnessed even more HMI SCADA Manufacturing Software news last week in Orlando. Yesterday I discussed the re-write of Ignition 8 by Inductive Automation. Today two more items. Yes, there was room for improvement in this technology area.
- AVEVA announced updates to (Wonderware) InTouch HMI, InTouch Edge HMI, System Platform, Historian, and AVEVA Insight products
- GE Digital announced iFix 6.0 and discussed the new GE Digital
AVEVA Updates Monitoring, Control, and Information Management Portfolio
Company spokespeople said the updates are delivering edge-to-cloud integration and advanced visualisation tools, along with seamless access to advanced applications and powerful analytics. They also announced commercial flexibility with subscription.
With these capabilities available in a hybrid cloud model, customers can quickly bridge OT and IT requirements, create reusable industrial applications with rapid time to value, and drive operational efficiency with increased visibility across multiple levels of an organisation, in the discrete, process, hybrid and infrastructure industries.
AVEVA CEO Craig Hayman said, “AVEVA is committed to partnering with our customers to achieve maximum value from industrial digital transformation. We enable smarter decisions by creating innovative technology. The latest enhancements in our Monitoring, Control and Information Management portfolio, exemplified by the benefits delivered through the ADNOC Panorama initiative, perfectly illustrate how we are empowering our customers with edge-to-enterprise visibility.”
Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) was cited as an example use case. The Panorama Digital Command Centre enables ADNOC to monitor and optimise the performance of its assets and operations across 16 operating companies (OPCOs) from their Abu Dhabi headquarters. This includes oil and gas development and production, through to processing, petroleum and chemical products to transportation and distribution
H.E. Dr Sultan Al Jaber, ADNOC Group CEO, said, “The Panorama Digital Command Centre demonstrates how ADNOC is utilising cutting-edge technology to find new ways to optimise our assets, unlock value and drive efficiencies across the company. It provides a single access point to critical operational and performance information, facilitating smarter and faster decision-making and better enabling us to uncover new solutions.”
GE Digital Announces Updated iFix
GE Digital announced a new version of iFIX. Part of the Predix portfolio, the new iFIX 6.0 gives users the most informed view of the problem or task and secure visualization from anywhere at any time.
“We are excited to announce a number of powerful improvements to our iFIX offering,” said Matt Wells, Vice President of Product Management for GE Digital. “Building on our heritage as an industrial company, we are intimately familiar with the challenges our customers face every day. Industrial companies are looking for better ways to quickly build new SCADA applications, improve user performance and respond to changing needs while maintaining the security of the application. By leveraging standards such as OPCUA, integrated support for ISA alarm shelving, and enabling new web development tools, iFIX 6.0 allows organizations to rapidly build new applications while ensuring the stability and security of their operations and empowering operators to respond better to changing conditions in real time.”
iFIX 6.0 includes integrated support for ISA 18.2 standards for consistent alarm shelving and interface presentation, which enables operators to easily prioritize critical alarms to avoid spending unnecessary resources on less-pressing needs – helping plants to increase productivity by up to 70 percent. A new alarm summary grid allows operators to filter and focus on the critical alarms that matter, making it easier for immediate responders to review information and deal with the priority situation at hand.
Additionally, iFIX 6.0 now offers secure-by-design client connections with its new OPC Unified Architecture (UA) server – a machine-to-machine communications protocol for industrial automation. Incorporating the latest industrial interoperability standards ensures platform independence, meaning that iFIX 6.0 runs across a variety of hardware platforms and operating systems. Industrial organizations can now easily share data, alarms and events across supply chains with user authentication and encryption on iFIX 6.0.
“With iFIX, our operators are able to monitor system activity and respond immediately to any issues with full insights into what raised the alarm, helping us save time, reduce unnecessary downtime and meet compliance standards,” said Haley Lehman, Control Systems Technician, City of San Luis Obispo, Calif. “iFIX also allows us to get into the system from wherever we are, whether at home or out in the field. iFIX provides more reliable and readable information on demand, empowering plant operators to spend more time applying their expertise to the problem at hand and reducing the time spent navigating the system.”
iFIX 6.0 also provides new rapid application development features for HMI/SCADA, such as long tag names and descriptions – helping industrial users capture any hierarchy from their Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs). Rapid application development significantly speeds the configuration and deployment of HMI/SCADA, reducing costs and saving time for automation systems integrators and in-house engineering teams.
The iFIX 6.0 high performance HMI is based on ISA 101 standards, further improving safety and performance with more effective operator graphics. Users can access their iFIX high performance HMI screens in a native HTML5 format, supporting operators from any location and on any device. This also provides a more intuitive user experience which can help reduce operator errors and improve response time to events and incidents.
Like all products in the Predix portfolio, iFIX 6.0 provides immediate value on its own, or can be deployed alongside other Predix products to drive additional outcomes across a customer’s entire asset or system lifecycle. From data ingestion and processing at the edge to process and throughput improvements to broad fleet-wide optimization, the ecosystem of GE Digital solutions provides simple, accessible options for businesses at all phases of their digital transformation journey, regardless of maturity or vertical.
In December 2018, GE announced plans to establish a new, independent company focused on building a comprehensive Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) software portfolio. The GE-owned company will bring together GE Digital’s core software business – including the iFIX offering – with GE Power Digital and Grid Software Solutions and will start with $1.2 billion in annual software revenue. Based on proven domain expertise and with more than 20,000 customers globally, the new company will provide a complete, end-to-end digital offering that will enable customers to go from generating insights to driving outcomes.
www.ge.com/digital
by Gary Mintchell | Feb 14, 2019 | Manufacturing IT, Operations Management, Software
A long-time friend from the manufacturing software market asked what I had seen at ARC Industry Forum. Advances in HMI SCADA manufacturing software, I told her. Oh, I figured that was such a mature category that there couldn’t be anything new, she replied.
Inductive Automation used its very visible presence at a press conference and breakfast to promote the changes hinted at during the Ignition Community Conference last September. Principally it announced the Public Beta of Ignition 8.
Ignition was built from the ground up as database-centric and IT-friendly. It now is used by more than 1,900 integrators. Chief Strategy Officer Don Pearson told us that it is found in 48% of the Fortune 100 companies in one way or another.
The three major upgrade areas in Ignition 8 focus on Expanded architectures (for enterprise), Security, and Mobility.
Key information points include:
- Easier for large groups to work together
- Added inheritance—flexibility and dynamic
- Re-engineered tag system—customers have not been limited in number of tags they use so they use so many it is slowing the system, the revised system has made things much faster
- Security—always a focus, but time to evolve, compatible with federated identity structure, 2FA, single sign on, and the like.
- Mobile—developed Ignition Perspective, a tool for building mobile HMI, built in security, flexibility, functionality, based on HTML 5 and CSS 3.
- Source control—compatible with Git and GitHub for development and deployment
In other news, Inductive Automation and FreeWave Technologies, a leader in long-range wireless radios and edge computing platforms, are providing increased data visibility and a more reliable data network for industrial IoT customers with remote assets.
Ignition Edge MQTT, an edge-of-network software solution from Inductive Automation and Cirrus Link Solutions, can run on FreeWave’s hardened, C1D2 ZumIQ Edge Computer and the ZumLink IQ Intelligent Edge Radio to flawlessly perform edge-based data collection using various industrial protocols and data publishing using MQTT.
This publish/subscribe, or pub/sub, architecture provides granular data to anyone on the network and the proven ruggedness of the Zum platform provides a reliable home for applications that place analytics and intelligence alongside remote assets. As a result, the ZumLink IQ is an all-in-one solution that provides both secure data transmission over long distances and application deployment.
“This collaboration with FreeWave will provide real benefits to users,” said Don Pearson, chief strategy officer for Inductive Automation. “Today’s industrial users are certainly on a quest for more data, and edge computing is a big part of satisfying that demand.”
“The ZumLink hardware platform is a perfect example of why we developed the Ignition Edge MQTT product,” said Arlen Nipper, CTO and president of Cirrus Link Solutions, a leading innovator of pervasive computing technologies, and co-inventor of the MQTT messaging transport. “Having a modular platform with tools that are already SCADA/OT-aware is extremely important in any digital transformation journey. Having a mature set of tools on the Ignition platform that can run on ZumLink solves numerous migration strategy issues.”
“In the simplest analogy, we are the ‘I’ in ‘IoT,’ and Inductive Automation’s holistic approach to delivering automation solutions is not like any other software provider in the marketplace today,” said Kirk Byles, CEO, Freewave Technologies. “Our joint focus on enabling industrial customers with data platforms that can transform their operations while improving productivity and reducing operating costs is of paramount importance to both our companies’ missions. It’s a unique hand-in-glove type of relationship and it has many automation integrators excited about the endless opportunities that can be created from our partnership.”
