Wonderware Tech Note 726 “Capturing a Memory Dump File Using the Microsoft® Debug Diagnostic Tool (32bit)”

Wonderware released Tech Note 726 “Capturing a Memory Dump File Using the Microsoft® Debug Diagnostic Tool (32bit)”. This Tech Note details how to use the Debug Diagnostic Tool (DebugDiag) for troubleshooting issues such as hangs, slow performance, memory leaks or fragmentation, and crashes in any user-mode process. The tool includes additional debugging scripts for Internet Information Services (IIS) applications, web data access components, COM+ and related Microsoft technologies.

The Tech Note is available on the Wonderware Developer Network (WDN) website at https://wdnresource.wonderware.com/support/kbcd/html/1/t002501.htm

Free webinar on Wonderware Intelligence software available

As I informed earlier, Wonderware PacWest hosted a free webinar on the Wonderware Intelligence software on May 25th, 2010. Here’s a brief description of Wonderware Intelligence software.
I had a pleasure of being a presenter and a guest speaker during this webinar. For those customers of Wonderware PacWest who missed the presentation, it was recorded and is now available for download on the Wonderware PacWest website at http://www.pacwest.wonderware.com/web/Training/OnlineSeminars.aspx#Intelligence.
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Free Wonderware PacWest website login account is required to download the seminar (newly registered users – please allow 1 business day before attempting to download the seminar as your registration needs to be verified).
Non-PacWest customers are out of luck here, but I am available to speak about Wonderware Intelligence or any other Wonderware software. Just contact me at greg.dubiel@perfinfo.com

Wonderware Historian’s retrieval modes – free technical whitepaper from Wonderware North

Wonderware North released their Tech Tip on Wonderware Historian’s retrieval modes entitles “Wonderware Historian – A Look At Different Data Retrieval Methods”. The documents describes various retrieval modes of Historian in relation to data acquisition and it also compares built-in retrieval modes of Historian with standard Transact SQL aggregate functions.

The document can be found on the Wonderware North website.

Wonderware Application Server script attributes

The following table describes the scripting attributes available in Wonderware Application Server (aka Wonderware System Platform, aka ArchestrA software) version 3.x for each script defined in the Galaxy:

Attribute Description Run-Time Access (Supervisory, User, Read-Only, None)
<Script>.AsyncShutdownCmd If set to TRUE, the currently executing asynchronous script will be requested to shut down. This does not mean that the script actually will shut down. The script must be written to check this flag. Supervisory, User
<Script>.Disabled If set to TRUE, the calculation of the expression and the execution of the script code will be stopped. Supervisory, User
<Script>.ErrorCnt The number of errors detected for this script since last reset. Read-Only
<Script>.ExecutionCnt The number of times this script has executed since the last reset. Only applies to Execute type scripts, both synchronous and asynchronous. Read-Only
<Script>.ExecutionError.Condition If TRUE, the script engine encountered an error, such as divide-by-zero, .NET error or execution timeout) during last execution. This attribute can be alarmed. If alarmed, the alarm message is ExecutionError.Desc. Read-Only
<Script>.ExecutionError.Desc The error message associated with the execution error condition. Read-Only
<Script>.ExecutionTime The amount of time, in milliseconds, the script has been executing for asynchronous scripts. For synchronous scripts, this attribute reflects the time of the last execute. When the script has finished executing, the value remains at the final elapsed time for the script. When the script is restarted, this value is reset to zero (0). Read-Only
<Script>.ExecutionTimeAvg The average per scan execution time, in milliseconds, since the script was last reset. Read-Only
<Script>.ExecutionTimeStamp The last time the script executed. Read-Only
<Script>.State Indicates the state the object’s script is in: Initializing, Error, Disabled, Busy, Ready.

  • Initializing indicates at least one of the script’s external references in the script expression is still initializing.
  • Error indicates an error occurred since the last time the script was triggered.
  • Disabled indicates the script execution was disabled.
  • Busy indicates that the script is currently executing (only applies to asynchronous scripts).
  • Ready indicates that an asynchronous script is not currently executing or that a synchronous script is not in an error or disabled state.
Read-Only
<Script>.StatsReset If set to TRUE, all statistics will be set to zero. Supervisory, User

Wonderware Historian 10 will be released in February 2010

Wonderware Historian 10 is expected to be generally available in February 2010. It’s going to be the first major release in few years. It will introduce a set of new features included “tier historian” – read more about what’s new here. This release will also introduce support for SQL Server 2008 (32-bit only) and Windows Server 2008.
Wonderware customers that have a valid support agreement will be eligible to receive Historian 10 license for free. Contact Wonderware PacWest if you want to get on support.

Note: Wonderware Historian 10 will only support 32-bit version of SQL Server 2008 installed as a default instance. Named instances of SQL Server 2008 are not supported.

New Wonderware Intelligence Software 1.0 introduced

Invensys Wonderware recently introduced the new Wonderware Intelligence Software 1.0.

This new, easy-to-use enterprise manufacturing intelligence (EMI) solution enables customers to contextualize, aggregate and report both historian and operational data using role-based dashboards, presenting key performance indicators (KPIs) and real-time operational business metrics that are used to monitor, tune and optimize operations and supply chains.

Wonderware Intelligence Dashboard

Wonderware Intelligence software transforms data and information from multiple sources into business intelligence by aggregating process and production data in real time and adding contextual elements, such as equipment, product, work orders, material and personnel and others.

Adding the information context enables end-users to gain insights into the root causes of problems and understand how production or process events are related to each other or the final goal. The formatted information is saved and optimized for fast reporting and analysis, allowing end users to create and publish dashboards using the Wonderware Intelligence Analytics Client into a wide variety of web portals including Wonderware Information Server. Users can also configure customized metrics without programming.

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Additionally, the solution:

  • Acquires data not only from the Wonderware family of products, including MES, InBatch and Historian, but also from external systems such as ERP, LIMS, PDM or even other execution systems and historians, to provide plant, multi-plant and corporate-wide views of operations and performance.
  • Systems such as OSIsoft PI, Oracle databases, Wonderware Historian and SQL Server databases are supported by Wonderware Intelligence’s native connectors
  • Utilizes best-in-class tools for rapidly creating and publishing dashboards that can be rendered in commonly used web platforms such as Microsoft SharePoint, mySAP Enterprise Portal and Wonderware Information Server.
  • Furthers investments in the core Wonderware products, leveraging System Platform’s Integrated Development Environment (IDE) and services for configuration and deployment of the data model and allowing customers to incrementally add MES and EMI features and functionality easily and non-invasively.
  • Is a cross-functional product, applicable to any industry or market segment

Attached screenshots show examples of various dashboards created using Wonderware Intelligence Analytics Client and published to the web-based dashboard server included with the package. Dashboards published to the web remain fully interactive.

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Wonderware Intelligence consists of the following functional components:

  • ArchestrA Integrated Development Environment (IDE) which provides development environment for creating connections to data sources, dimensions and measures
  • Data Adapters – connectors to the source data. Intelligence 1.0 provides native connectors for Wonderware Historian, Wonderware MES Operations and Performance, Oracle. It also connects to any OLE DB data source including CSV files, Excel workbooks, Access databases etc.
  • Intelligence Data Store – it’s a multi-dimensional data store (in a form of Microsoft SQL Server database) which stores pre-aggregated measures for fast retrieval
  • Intelligence Server – the server connects to the data sources and performs the ETL (Extract, Transform and Load) functions and stores pre-aggregated measures in the Data Store
  • Intelligence Web Dashboard Server – which stores published, interactive dashboards and provides them to the web clients
  • Intelligence Analytics Client – rich client tool to create dashboards and publish them to the Dashboard Server (power user tool)
  • Intelligence ArchestrA Client – light-weight client that can retrieve published dashboards

Intelligence 1.0 Server is supported on Windows Server 2003 and 2008 (both, 32-bit and 64-bit versions), Microsoft SQL Server 2008 SP1 is a supported Intelligence Data Store container. The client tools are supported on Windows XP and Windows Vista operating systems.

Wonderware Industry Application for Facilities Management is available

Wonderware released the Industry Application for Facilities Management. The Wonderware Industry Application for Facilities Management provides a common SCADA system for facilities management solutions, able to collect and process building automation information from large distributed campuses or many buildings under central supervision.

The Wonderware Industry Application for Facilities Management is able to manage heterogeneous building automation system environments by supporting open industry communications standards such as BACnet, i.LON, Modbus and OPC.

The capability to scale a distributed SCADA solution from a few hundred to over one million I/O enables collection of centralized and decentralized facilities-related data for supervision of multiple buildings or sites. The Wonderware Industry Application for Facilities Management helps reduce costs by standardizing control, alarm and event monitoring functions for multiple sites into centralized control rooms.

Components available in the Wonderware Industry Application for Facilities Management include:

  • a library of ArchestrA graphic objects for Wonderware Application Server designed specifically for facilities management with animation and standard faceplates,
  • a template library of object device drivers, and communications objects for BACnet and i.LON SmartServer,
  • and an optional Application Generator for BACnet systems.

Click here to download the datasheet for the Wonderware Industry Application for Facilities Management.

Click here to download the general brochure on industry solutions for facilities management from Wonderware.

Below are examples of the library of graphics provided with the package:

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Below is an example of an ready to use object that comes with a predefined graphic:

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And below is an example of a complete screen with a preconfigured faceplate:

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Contact me at if you want to learn more.