Field Information Manager contains an OPC UA server for the following connections:
- ABB Ability™ client.
- 3rd Party software clients.
- Pub/Sub (/e.g. for ABB Ability™ Edgenius).
The integrated OPC UA server provides an information model according to the specification of Field Device Integration (FDI) 1.2. It is dynamic and adjusts during runtime according to available data, e.g. if devices are added, removed or changed while working with Field Information Manager.
Note:
The integrated OPC UA server is a licensed feature.
Depending on the supported OPC UA connections, different license options are available.
Status Indication
The OPC UA server and its functionality is an integrated functionality and operates in the background therefore.
Further information about its status and activities is displayed in the footer bar of Field Information Manager window:
- Starting: OPC UA server starts up and is not ready yet.
- Ready: OPC UA server is started up completely and ready for communication.
- Active: OPC UA server is in active communication and uploads data.
Features of OPC UA Server
The OPC UA server allows subscriptions to device data, e.g. parameter values.
The tool starts uploads of corresponding data right after subscribing by the client. The upload intervals of certain parameters can be configured and monitored individually in the Process Cockpit.
Note:
Used Namespaces and assigned Common Names are also available via OPC UA and allow subscriptions with a generic access model for the different devices.
Pub/Sub
Pub/Sub is a standard of the OPC UA specification for publishing and subscribing data in an
efficient way.
The Field Information Manager Server acts as the publisher and provides access to the published
data on a defined address.
Note:
The Namespace "PA-DIM" is disabled because it is too large with the complete set of defined Common Names for efficient publishing with Pub/Sub.
Recommendation is to export the Namespace "PA-DIM" and reduce the number of Common Names to create a user-defined Namespace (e.g. "PA-DIM Custom") with a subset for the required parameters.
This can be imported and mapped to the corresponding parameters.
Within the options menu, the new Namespace can be enabled for Pub/Sub.
Publishing will be more efficiently and the reduced number of Common Names helps to reach the required performance.
More Information
For further details on the integrated OPC UA Server, its functionalities and instructions how to setup a connection, please refer to Field Information Manager - User Guide (7PAA000045*) which is delivered with the Field Information Manager software.