in our machines we’re using an X20-PLC with mappView running on it and displaying the GUI on a Power Panel T50 hardware.
The configuration of the T50 (like boot logo, network config, configuration of the mappView server to be connected, enabling OPC UA server, disabling buzzer audio, etc.) has been set up once in Automation Studio and then the remote installation structure has been created (Project → Project installation → Generate project installation package). The result is the .xml file containing all the T50 configuration and boot logo file as .bmp.gz.
To upload the configuration and the boot logo to the T50 hardware, we put the files on a USB stick, connect it to the T50, manually go to the service page and upload it via “Update → Update settings / boot logo / system”.
Are there any other automatic ways to initially set up the T50 hardware? I’ve seen in the help that it’s possible via OPC UA too, but this requires that the OPC server on the T50 is enabled beforehand → that’s a manual step again.
If you have SNMP enabled on the interface that the T50 is connected to and the T50 is configured to the Automation Studio project you can use the “Load configuration from PLC” option from the service pages (Update).
It is also possible to configure the PLC to supply the whole configuration including the T50 Operating System. This however requires you to setup either FTP or TFTP server on the PLC and transferring the files to be shared by the server. Automation Help: T50 Update Server Configuration
I’ve also seen the “Load configuration from PLC” option, but this again means that an operator has to press the option button on the T50. We would like to fully automate the T50 configuration if possible (without any operator action at all).
Your 2. proposal could be the solution (PLC supplies the whole config to the T50). As I can see from the documentation the settings from your screenshot are the default settings, so no manual change on the T50 required (TFTP is set and “Get update server from DHCP server” is enabled).
FTP and TFTP are enabled on our PLC anyway.
The only thing I have to configure on the PLC side is to set the interface to the T50 as DHCP server (right now it’s set to manual network configuration) and put the T50 files on the PLC’s FTP server.
Am I missing something? Do I still need SNMP to be enabled on the PLC in this case?
I am not entirely sure this can be completely automated. As the OPC UA server option on the T50 is disabled by default. Also I am not entirely sure about is whether the T50 will get the update server properly from the PLC’s DHCP server. That would require some testing, unless someone has tested that.
You don’t need SNMP to be enabled unless you want to use the “Load configuration from PLC” option.
After testing several options and some help of B&R support, this is the conclusion:
Fully automatic configuration of the T50 (without the need of the operator to even “touch” the hardware) by only connecting to a PLC is not possible as @tommi.piiparinen already assumed.
Although we can enable TFTP on our PLC (PPC50 in this case) to which our T50 is connected, it is not possible to use TFTP as update server type on the T50, which is the default setting:
TFTP is only used internally on the C50 but can not be used by an external client. Also the option “Get update server from DHCP server” must be deactivated because the DHCP server on any B&R PLC using Automation Runtime can not provide the necessary update server information (this is still a selectable option due to compatibility reasons).
In any case an operator has to manually trigger the upload on the T50’s service page “Update”.
With our hardware setup (PLC + T50) there are two main options we can use anyway:
“Load Configuration from PLC” (As already described by @tommi.piiparinen)
