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  • MVP 2014

Hello,

If I am the only one that doesn't understand this please accept my apologies.

The changelog for Visilogic 8.6.3 list the following addition to Visilogic.

In Communication & OS > PC Settings, TCP/IP Address Selector now offers a HOST option

However I can't see any real change from previous versions of Visilogic. Can anyone help explain this feature?

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Simon, I understand B)

If anyone were to record me, talking to myself while I am testing software...'Wait. What just happened? Is that a bug? Nah...I probably did I something stupid. Wait--did load the right OS? I better do it again...Wait--I think it maybe is a bug...Hold on. Did I select the right Swapper version...? .....' ad infinitum B)

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Cara, does this is mean that we should expect multithreaded visilogic listener?

If this is true - we need it "yesterday", as well for new Download Manager. This is really hot feature.

No, visiligic can accept only 1 connection. (How would you show the Operands values and HMI display of remote access when several PLCs connect to Visilogic?).

The new Download Manager also doesn't support Listeners since it problematic. When you use the Downloader you tell it "I want that application on that PLC (by a givien communication settings)". When having several PLCs connected to the same Port, how would you know which application should be downloaded to which PLC?

There are several other issues regarding this concept.

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No, visiligic can accept only 1 connection. (How would you show the Operands values and HMI display of remote access when several PLCs connect to Visilogic?).

It wouldn't make much sense right now, as VisiLogic only supports having a single program open at any one time. If a future version were to support multiple programs being open at once (like almost any other modern application) then having a connection open for each program would be sensible and potentially very useful (think debugging networked PLC applications without having a laptop for each PLC.)

The new Download Manager also doesn't support Listeners since it problematic. When you use the Downloader you tell it "I want that application on that PLC (by a givien communication settings)". When having several PLCs connected to the same Port, how would you know which application should be downloaded to which PLC?

Well, the PLCs can have unique names, and must have unique IP addresses. That can be a way of sorting out which PLC is which, but I don't really see the benefit of having multiple simultaneous connections to the Download Manager, unless I'm missing something obvious...

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I'll try to explain my situation and my "dream":

At the moment we have almost 1500 Unitronics PLC installed on our clients sites. This number increases on 150-300 units annually and we are providing maintenance and support for all those PLC's . This include fast response on any clients issue ( mostly through Visilogic debug mode) and frequent PLC application update to the latest version.

For that purpose we are currently keeping few hundreds of all kinds remote connections to our clients networks with Visilogic installed on every remote server.

The "dream" is to have 1 server locating on our host with public static IP.

Server should have visilogic with "multi-threaded visilogic listener" for support and Download Manager for application update.

Each PLC installed on client site will be connected to "multi-threaded visilogic listener". In the "HOST" mode, instead "favorites" visilogic should provide list of PLC's connected to Visilogic with its IP's and named, then user will select 1 unit to debug or download.

Same about application update through Download Manager.

I am well aware about difficulties in developing multi-threaded applications as well that the current Visilogic is based on the ActiveX library, which is not really suitable for such tasks. But Download Manager is based on .Net 4.0 framework.

We already developed a server application (written in Java) for our clients, which provide simultaneous connection between user's SQL server and users PLC's for data exchange. It works pretty well.

Now we are looking for a similar way to improve our support and to automate PLC programs update.

In other words ultimately, we want to make PLC works same way as my PS3, which is connected to PlayStation network and receives all necessary OS updates and connected to game server for on-line play.

One of the options that we considering to automate PLC update is to make a server application which will listen and accept connection from remote PLC's and distribute "clone" files directly to SD card. Than PLC in appropriate time will update itself from SD.

But if Download Manager can do the job, it will save us a lot of time and efforts.

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