SPS 2014 – PROFINET for Machine Builders

loading… Machine builders have long been using PROFINET. At the SPS Fair this year we paid tribute to them with a machine to print, build, and launch paper airplanes. Like many real production machines, this one had multiple modules. The three interdependent modules communicated over PROFINET. And each module was controlled by PROFINET. Twelve vendors…

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SPS 2014 – The Fair

loading… What had an area of more than 22 American football fields (including the end zones)? Yes, the SPS/IPC/Drives Fair. [Some more nomenclature: SPS is German for PLC. In German: Speicherprogrammierbare Steuerung.] The statistics: Exhibition space 117,800 square meters (over a million and a quarter square feet in 14 sprawling buildings) Exhibitors 1,602 (one third…

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SPS 2014 – A First Look

loading… PROFINET, PROFIBUS, IO-Link, PROFIsafe, and PROFIenergy were featured on the PI stand at SPS/IPC/Drives along with a combined PROFINET and PROFIBUS application wall for process. [Some nomenclature: “Stand” is typically used where Americans would say “booth.” So, we were “on the stand” and “in the booth.” Americans call SPS/IPC/Drives a “show” while locals call…

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SPS/IPC/Drives Show Is Now!

loading… Today marks the first day of the SPS/IPC/Drives Show and we’re there. Watch the Twitter feed @AllThngsPROFI for news, photos, and videos of the show in general and PROFINET and PROFIBUS news in particular. This chat between Dennis van Booma (CEO PROCENTEC) and Karsten Schneider (PI Chairman) anticipates the show. They also speak about…

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General Assembly Meeting Wrap-Up 2

loading… Industrial Internet of Things (cont’d) I’ve been asked to give a little background on the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) covered in the first GAM 14 post. In general, the Internet of Things refers to the collection of smart objects connected to the Internet. It can be broken down into three realms: Consumer Commercial…

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General Assembly Meeting Wrap-Up

loading… 2014 General Assembly Meeting Wrap-Up Being our 20th anniversary, we set out to make this year’s Meeting a bit of a special event. From the Tuesday evening reception to the Wednesday evening boat-cruise-networking-event to the discussions during the day, all in all it was a very successful event. Industrial Internet of Things The Industrial…

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Hanover Fair, News on Condition Monitoring

loading… With the PROFINET specification complete and stable, work continues on application profiles. An application profile standardizes the way data is sent and received to simplify user interaction; the underlying communications protocol is not impacted. As one example, PI is the only organization that has created standards for taking information from the plant floor to…

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Green, Green, It’s Green, They Say…

loading… Green, green, it’s green, they say… on the far side of the hill AND in Hanover and Stuttgart: On Wednesday, Winfried Kretschmann (center) visited the PI booth. He is Minister-President of the state of Baden-Württemberg and the first Minister-President in German history from the Green Party. He was introduced to PROFINET and PROFIenergy, the…

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Hanover Fair, News

loading… Here are a couple news items from PI at Hanover Fair. PROFINET in Process PROFIBUS PA and PROFINET play well together, we are reminded. Our addition of functions such as CiR (Configuration in Run), Redundancy, Time synchronization, and Time stamping (Sequence of Events) and the proven standardized proxy solution for integrating fieldbus systems of…

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Hanover Fair 2014, PROFIpeople

loading… Some PI North America members have exhibits or will be stopping by the booth (Hall 9, Stand D68). Be sure to look them up. Many of our colleagues from the PI Support Center are there: here is Dr. Peter Wenzel: At the booth reception desk, Wolfgang Quint and Iris Ketterer of the PI Support…

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