Ethernet networks have taken over as the prominent bus architecture for industrial automation networks. And for good reason.

Ethernet simplifies and homogenizes connectivity between industrial devices. We don’t have to worry about male or female DB9 and DB25 serial connectors, no concern for DTE or DCE devices, and forget about straight-through vs. null-modem cables. In general, the world is a much happier place.

However, even with the added simplicity Ethernet offers, troubleshooting Ethernet networks can be a bit more involved than serial networks.

Let’s assume you’re trying to establish communication with an industrial Ethernet device that for whatever reason has dropped off the network. Here are a few tips I always use when starting to troubleshoot an industrial Ethernet network.

Process Control

Process control systems are used in everything from advanced manufacturing to run-of-the-mill activities at home, like heating your house and brewing your beer. (You do brew your own beer, don't you?)

A control system that manufactures a product requires monitoring and control of many different process variables, while some at home require little more than a timer. For example, in manufacturing we may use flow meters to make sure fluids flow through pipes at a certain rate, or float meters to ensure ingredients fill a vat to a specified level.

When I brew beer at home, I may use a temperature sensor in my mash tun, wired to a controller that’s controlling my heating element to keep the mash tun at just the right temperature for optimum starch-to-sugar conversion. This is an example of a closed-loop control system.

(To see how small closed-loop control principles are scaled up to build industrial process control applications, check out the New Belgium Brewery case study and see how they use Opto 22 gear to brew their world-famous Fat Tire and other beers.)

Opto 22 will exhibit and present at ELC + OpenIoT Summit North America

About the Show

This month Opto 22 is exhibiting and presenting a technical workshop at the Open IoT Summit in Portland, Oregon.

It's a great opportunity to take a look at some of our new products and solutions that leverage open technology—like a REST API for an industrial controller and Node-RED running on our groov Box.

Ahh, the Sixties...

The 1960s was a decade full of inventions, especially innovative new tools that the manufacturing industry would eventually adopt:

• In 1964 the BASIC computer language was invented.
• The following year the compact disc went on sale in the US for a mere $1,000 per unit (maybe that’s why software was so darned expensive).
• 1969 brought us the first barcode scanner.
• And that same year Al Gore invented the Internet, leading to the development of the Industrial Internet of Things as we know it today. Way to go, Al.

Drones are playing a key role in the Industrial Internet of Things. Not to mention the fact that they’re pretty much all the rage today with just about everyone.

I would hazard a guess that almost everyone you know knows someone who has one. They’re in all the stores at the mall, the military has fleets of them protecting the skies, and I can’t wait to see Amazon’s version dropping my packages off on my front doorstep.

Understanding how productive, efficient, and profitable your business operations are takes constant monitoring and analysis.

One of the tools used in manufacturing, automation, and process control to stay on top of these metrics is  key performance indicators, or KPIs.

KPIs can be applied to all levels of a business, from manufacturing to sales, marketing, operations, and customer service.

Attention industrial engineers: If you're not thinking about how secure that new wiz-bang-flashy PLC or PAC is before you purchase it, you're setting yourself up for a world of pain down the road.

Industrial control systems are used across a wide range of industries, from manufacturing and fabrication, to electricity generation and transmission, to oil refining and water treatment—all industries where a network security compromise could mean huge losses of capital for the business.

Recently we’re seeing many of these traditionally proprietary control systems—distributed control systems, PLCs, and SCADA applications—adding new, more open technologies like Ethernet and TCP/IP. And with organizations' increasing interest in the business advantages of obtaining system data, industrial control systems are now being connected to information technology (IT) networks.

That's scary.

If you’ve been listening to all the hype around the Fourth Industrial Revolution, the Internet of Things, Industrie 4.0, or my favorite, the Industrial Internet of Things (pretty sure they’re all roughly the same thing), you’ve no doubt heard the term machine learning thrown around.

In a previous blog post I wrote about the Internet of Things getting hacked. As the IIoT ramps up and we continue to connect more devices to networks, we increase our industrial assets' exposure to cyber attacks. And we all need to start thinking about cyber security first, not as an afterthought.

It's everyone's responsibility to plan for cyber security, starting when you first evaluate industrial assets for purchase. 

Here are five checklist items to think about before connecting any industrial device to a network. No, this is not an exhaustive list, but frankly I don't want take up that much of your time. (You're welcome!) This is good starting point, though.

The image below still cracks me up. The captions for each of the devices are hilarious.

But in truth, ransomware is a pretty scary subject, especially when you think of it in the context of industrial technology and applications. And there’ve been quite a few unnerving stories about ransomware hacks in industrial applications lately.