The OPC Foundation defines open standard interfaces for industrial automation. The interface standards allow industrial software from different vendors to work together without the need for custom software interfaces.
The OPC Foundation defines two types of interface:
The Fernhill SCADA OPC Client driver acts as an OPC client application. The driver supports OPC UA Servers and OPC Classic Servers. Using the driver you can map Fernhill SCADA tags to items in an external OPC Server. Tag values can be read at a fixed interval, or on demand, or both.
The OPC Client driver provides these tag types:
| Icon | Tag Type | Version | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| OPC Classic Connection | 1.3 | A connection to an external OPC Classic Data Access Server. |
| OPC UA Connection | 3.69 | A connection to an external OPC UA Server. |
To configure a connection to an OPC Server, do the following:
You can use these I/O Data Point Tags to represent individual data points in the OPC Server:
| Icon | Tag Type | Version | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
 | I/O Analog Data Point Tag | 3.12 | Maps an Analog Data Point Tag to an external data source. |
 | I/O Digital Data Point Tag | 3.12 | Maps a Digital Data Point Tag to an external data source. |
 | I/O String Data Point Tag | 3.12 | Maps a String Data Point Tag to an external data source. |
 | I/O Word Data Point Tag | 3.12 | Maps a 16-bit Word Data Point Tag to an external data source. |
 | I/O Double Word Data Point Tag | 3.12 | Maps a 32-bit Double Word Data Point Tag to an external data source. |
 | I/O Long Word Data Point Tag | 3.48 | Maps a 64-bit Long Word Data Point Tag to an external data source. |
To maximize interoperability, the OPC Client Driver uses a minimal subset of the OPC Interfaces:
| Server Interfaces | Group Interfaces |
|---|---|
| IOPCServer | IOPCItemMgt, IOPCSyncRead |
For information about other drivers available in Fernhill SCADA.
For the meaning of terms used in Fernhill SCADA.