If you work on control systems for a pharmaceutical, biotech, or medical device manufacturer, you’ve probably heard the phrase “the system needs to be Part 11 compliant” tossed around in a project kickoff meeting, usually …
OPC DA is one of the most widely used industrial communication technologies for exchanging real-time data between PLCs, SCADA systems, HMIs, historians, and other automation software. Although newer technologies such as OPC UA are becoming …
Choosing the wrong DDC controller doesn’t just cost you money. It costs you callbacks, retrofits, and a control system that can’t grow with the building it serves. Whether you’re specifying a controller for a new …
PROFINET has quietly powered millions of industrial Ethernet nodes for over two decades, and it just received its most significant overhaul yet. PI (PROFIBUS & PROFINET International) has released PROFINET Version 2.5, and this isn’t …
If you work with PLCs, HMIs, or SCADA networks, you’ve probably heard IEC 62443 mentioned in a project spec, an audit, or a vendor’s datasheet, usually without much explanation of what it actually means for …
Every few months, someone asks me the same question in a different shape: “Which industrial protocol is the most secure: Modbus, BACnet, MQTT, or OPC UA?” The honest answer is that this is the wrong …
Every controls engineer has sat through a meeting where someone from corporate says, “We need to be more Industry 4.0,” without defining what that actually means for the panel they’re wiring or the PLC program …
If you’ve spent any time around control panels, you’ve probably heard the terms “PLC” and “PAC” used almost interchangeably, sometimes even by people who should know better. They’re not the same thing, and picking the …
If you’ve spent any time around modern PLCs, SCADA systems, or MES platforms, you’ve probably run into the term OPC UA. It gets mentioned constantly in the same breath as Industry 4.0, IIoT, and digital …
If you’ve spent any time around plant floors, control rooms, or automation vendor pitches in the last few years, you’ve heard the term “IIoT” thrown around, usually next to buzzwords like “digital transformation” and “smart …