InFocus
Copyright ã MainRobin Pty Ltd 1997

Getting Started With InFocus

Introduction

Welcome to MR-InFocus ! Mr-InFocus is a Man Machine Interface (MMI) for TI-Simatic and Modicon PLC's that have a TCP/IP interface.

Using MR-InFocus you will be surprised how quick and easy it is to create a graphical interface for your PLC system. MR-InFocus was designed as a Win32 Winsock client application to support Modbus and CAMP host devices on TCP/IP networks including the internet.

Fast, robust communications and an easy to interface were the main design criteria, with an aim towards a light weight, integrated solution that didn't rely on expensive I/O servers.

MR-InFocus is not intended to replace the more established SCADA/MMI systems. It was created in the tradition of other classic Winsock/Win32 client applications for the FTP, POP, HTML protocols, only it is for the new TCP/IP style PLC hosts. With Modbus and Common Ascii Messaging Protocol as the supported application protocols.

The demonstration version of MR-InFocus will run for 1 hour with full functionality before shutting down. When a security key is fitted, the application will start in normal operational mode.

The Demonstration Screens

When InFocus is installed a demonstration configuration is included in the installation. It is recommended that you take some time to go through the demonstration screens to see what InFocus is capable of. For more information on InFocus, refer to the InFocus help file.

To simulate a real PLC for demonstration purposes. The CTI Server program has been installed. When you press the Start/Restart Comms button at the bottom of the screen this simply starts the CTIServer program to simulate a real PLC so the demonstration screens have live data.  

Please Note: The demonstration screens were developed on a system with a screen resolution of 1024x768, running the demonstration on systems with higher screen resolution may cause some text to be clipped.

Getting Started With Your Own Configuration

To create your own configuration with InFocus, there are two steps:

1. Define the connection to host PLC devices
2. Build the forms that display the information 

Defining a host device

In order that InFocus can read a PLC, The device properties for the host PLC must be defined. To achieve the most efficient use of network bandwidth, InFocus requires that a memory map be allocated in the PLC and that you set the address of the memory map in the devices properties.

To define a host device, perform the following steps

1. 	Select design mode from the security manager on the toolbar
2. 	Select the system configuration dialog from the main menu under 
	Configure|System Configuration...
3.	Select the Device Details tab
4.	Select the device you would like to configure, then enter the properties for that 	device.