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There are four main types of data that the EFM ABB Totalflow driver is capable of getting from an ABB Totalflow device. These are:
AARs are polled at a specified interval based on a poll rate and then made available via the OPC-UA interface.
Alarms, events, and history are made available to MQTT Transmission to be published as immutable Record objects to an MQTT server. Typically these would be received by the MQTT Engine and MQTT Recorder modules running on a central Ignition Gateway and inserted into a database for later use or to be made available to other third party systems.
Common Exchange File (CFX) can also be used for these record data.
The quickstart will guide you through setting up the EFM ABB Totalflow driver module and configuring the device connection to:
It will also describe how to use the default Array-Register templates to generate custom templates and poll groups and how to view Alarm, Event, and Periodic and Daily History data
| Module | Parameter | Definition |
|---|---|---|
| EFM ABB Totalflow Settings | Array-Register Definitions (Global) | The global Array-Register definitions made available to the EFM ABB Totalflow module. They are uploaded to the Ignition instance either as individual INI files or as ZIP archives that contain INI files. Note that INI files are text files that are read by PCCU or WinCCU to determine how to display data within an application. These global Array-Register definitions can be referenced by the configurations of the individual ABB Totalflow devices that they apply to. A single Ignition Gateway may contain multiple global Array-Register definitions files that are used to configure Array-Register Templates (i.e. templates that contain array, register, access type, data type, and register name info) for available application types (enumerations) |
| EFM ABB Totalflow Settings | Totalflow Applications Definitions (Global) | The global Totalflow Applications Definitions are uploaded to the Ignition instance as individual CSV files and contain the following information about Totalflow applications:
|
| EFM ABB Totalflow Settings | The periodic mapping files are used for building up EFM Periodic and Daily History records. They map various record fields to database column names so that user can adjust those column names to match requirements. Periodic mappings also allow to exclude certain record fields to be used. They are uploaded to the Ignition instance in the form of specifically formatted CSV files | |
| OPC UA Device Connection | This is a list of applications (fields include respective name, slot number, enumeration, revision and type) that are currently installed on a Totalflow device. This list is obtained either by 'auto-discovery' process that takes place on configuration/restart or by importing specifically formatted CSV file | |
| OPC UA Device Connection | Totalflow Applications Definitions (Device) | These are a subset of the global Totalflow Applications Definition files that apply to a specific device |
| OPC UA Device Connection | These are a subset of the global Array-Register definition files that apply to a specific device | |
| OPC UA Device Connection | Array-Register Templates | Array-Register templates are logical groupings of AARs. Generally, Array-Register templates would be created so that instances of them can be used by specifying a poll group with application slot number |
| OPC UA Device Connection | Poll Groups | Poll groups use Array-Register templates in conjunction with application slot number to create a specific groups of register sets (i.e. sets of consecutive array registers) to be polled at a specified poll rate |
The Cirrus Link default Array-Register Definitions and EFM Periodic Mapping files can be used as a starting point for configuring the EFM ABB Totalflow module.
The Totalflow Application Definitions file can be used as an example if you need to add application definitions that are not known to the driver.
There are 12 basic steps to getting all of the data available from an ABB Totalflow into Ignition
From the EFM ABB Totalflow Settings, define/upload the global Array-Register definitions available for all Totalflow devices in this Ignition instance
From the EFM ABB Totalflow Settings, define/upload the global Totalflow applications definitions available for all Totalflow devices in this Ignition instance.
Navigate to the 'Array-Register Templates' configuration panel. If 'Auto-Generate Templates and Poll Group' is enabled, verify the default templates are added to this device definition. If this configuration option is disabled, manually import the templates that apply.
One default Array-Register template will be created per each application type (i.e. application enumeration) given that polling for at least one instance of this application type is enabled in the 'Totalflow Applications' panel.
If there are no enabled applications at the time auto-discovery runs for the first time, no Array-Register templates will be created.
If there are enabled applications but there are no Array-Register definitions applied to this device connection, or definitions that are applied have no applicable entries based of application enumeration; in this case, Array-Register templates will be created but those templates will have no entries. If applicable Array-Register definitions are added later, templates will be populated.
At this point, the ABB Totalflow device should be fully configured. To view data in Ignition launch Ignition Designer and open the OPC Tag Browser as shown below. You should see the tags being polled from the ABB Totalflow device as shown below. You can use these tags as any standard OPC tags in Ignition.
This section will describe how to use default Array-Register templates to generate custom templates and poll groups.
For the purpose of this exercise, lets assume that we only want to poll the AGA3-1 application, and we are interested in 'Current Values' and 'Fixed Analysis' data points only. Here is how to do it:
Record data can be viewed in a couple of ways:
If using Common File Exchange (CFX), the record data will be stored/maintained in CFX.MD5 files on the local Ignition instance. See the ABB Totalflow Device Connection configuration for more details.
These files can be transferred from the Edge device using any method you choose such as FTP but can also be published using the MQTT Transmission File Publishing option.
To do this, you will need to configure an MQTT Transmission File Record and set the CFX File Transfer parameter to point to that File Record and the CFX files can then be automatically published. See the Creating and Publishing Common Exchange File CFX tutorial for details.
To publish and view record data which includes ABB Totalflow alarms, events, and history data you must have MQTT Transmission installed on the instance with the EFM ABB Totalflow driver.
In addition, the following must be set up:
At the Central Gateway:
At the Edge Gateway:
If you do not have a Transmitter configured, create an MQTT Transmitter and set the Sparkplug Settings to the unique Group and Edge Node ID values generated by the Device Connection configuration.
OR
For Events and/or History data set the respective poll rates to zero and set the 'Record Info Scan Rate' option to a positive number
Alarms can come from two sources:
PERIODIC_HISTORY_RECORDS - Alarms are obtained from the Log Period records (Array 250) and in this case the 'Alarm Scan Rate' should be set to -1.
ALARM_LOG_RECORDS - Alarms are obtained from only meters with the enhanced option turned on
When all of these conditions are met, alarm, event, and/or history data will be collected, published, and stored via MQTT Recorder in the configured database.
The Array-Register definition archive file may contain lots of INI files - for example, the Array-Register Definitions zip file above contains 1477 files.
So it worth explaining how the ABB Totalflow driver selects which files to parse to create Array_Regsiter Templates. When global Array-Register definitions are applied to a device connection, the driver uses application revision information obtained during the 'auto-discovery' process and selects INI file names that match application revision and variant numbers. As an example, below is application information obtained during the auto-discovery:
Note that since the revision number for the AGA3-1 meter application is 2101306-006, the INI parser will look for the 2101306-006.ini file in submitted ZIP archive.
If no direct match is found, it will look for the another possible match based on the revision number (i.e. 2101306) and revision variant (i.e. 005 and lower).
A user can check what INI files were picked by the driver as a source of Array-Register definitions. This information can be obtained form default Array-Register template generated by the driver by following the 'View INI Files' link as shown below:
Below is an example that shows a portion the 2101306-006.ini file for the AGA3 Tube Application:
[Live Analysis Data] ExtHlp 5000 Help 1171 #Columns=2,Description=300,Value=100
dsc:Last Update from THERMS;cmd:4.5.1;typ:S;rwa:1;
dsc:Last Update from Other Source;cmd:4.2.2;typ:D;rwa:1;
dsc:Heating Value Live @ Tb and Pb;cmd:4.3.45;typ:F;
dsc:Real Relative Density Live @ Tb and Pb;cmd:4.3.44;typ:F;
dsc:N2 Live;cmd:4.3.46;typ:F;
dsc:CO2 Live;cmd:4.3.47;typ:F;
dsc:Methane Live;cmd:4.3.51;typ:F;
dsc:H2S Live;cmd:4.3.48;typ:F;
dsc:H2O Live;cmd:4.3.49;typ:F;
dsc:Helium Live;cmd:4.3.50;typ:F;
dsc:Ethane Live;cmd:4.3.52;typ:F;
dsc:Propane Live;cmd:4.3.53;typ:F;
dsc:N-Butane Live;cmd:4.3.54;typ:F;
dsc:I-Butane Live;cmd:4.3.55;typ:F;
dsc:N-Pentane Live;cmd:4.3.56;typ:F;
dsc:I-Pentane Live;cmd:4.3.57;typ:F;
dsc:N-Hexane Live;cmd:4.3.58;typ:F;
dsc:N-Heptane Live;cmd:4.3.59;typ:F;
dsc:N-Octane Live;cmd:4.3.60;typ:F;
dsc:N-Nonane Live;cmd:4.3.61;typ:F;
dsc:N-Decane Live;cmd:4.3.62;typ:F;
dsc:Oxygen Live;cmd:4.3.63;typ:F;
dsc:Carbon Monoxide Live;cmd:4.3.64;typ:F;
dsc:Hydrogen Live;cmd:4.3.65;typ:F;
dsc:Argon Live;cmd:4.3.66;typ:F;
The ABB Totalflow driver parses selected INI file and uses the info (Array-Register definitions) to generate Array-Register templates as shown below.
Note how highlighted (bold) lines shown above correlate to Array-Register Templates shown below.
Let's look at the 'dsc:N2 Live;cmd:4.3.46;typ:F;' line in more detail. The point description (i.e. N2 Live) is being used as a tag name. The 'typ:F' is the data type (i.e. floating point). Finally, the '4.3.46' defines the AAR (i.e. application, array, and register).
As a result, a default Array-Register Template is generated by the driver for a specific application enumeration, and it contains all Array-Register points found in appropriate INI files.
Additional Resources
There are four main types of data that the EFM ABB Totalflow driver is capable of getting from an ABB Totalflow device. These are:
AARs are polled at a specified interval based on a poll rate and then made available via the OPC-UA interface. Alarms, events, and history are made available to MQTT Transmission to be published as immutable Record objects to an MQTT server. Typically these would be received by the MQTT Engine and MQTT Recorder modules running on a central Ignition Gateway and inserted into a database for later use or to be made available to other third party systems.
The quickstart will guide you through setting up the EFM ABB Totalflow driver module and configuring the device connection to:
It will also describe how to use the default Array-Register templates to generate custom templates and poll groups and how to view Alarm, Event, and Periodic and Daily History data
| Module | Parameter | Definition |
|---|---|---|
| EFM ABB Totalflow Settings | Array-Register Definitions (Global) | The global Array-Register definitions made available to the EFM ABB Totalflow module. They are uploaded to the Ignition instance either as individual INI files or as ZIP archives that contain INI files. Note that INI files are text files that are read by PCCU or WinCCU to determine how to display data within an application. These global Array-Register definitions can be referenced by the configurations of the individual ABB Totalflow devices that they apply to. A single Ignition Gateway may contain multiple global Array-Register definitions files that are used to configure Array-Register Templates (i.e. templates that contain array, register, access type, data type, and register name info) for available application types (enumerations) |
| EFM ABB Totalflow Settings | Totalflow Applications Definitions (Global) | The global Totalflow Applications Definitions are uploaded to the Ignition instance as individual CSV files and contain the following information about Totalflow applications:
|
| EFM ABB Totalflow Settings | The periodic mapping files are used for building up EFM Periodic and Daily History records. They map various record fields to database column names so that user can adjust those column names to match requirements. Periodic mappings also allow to exclude certain record fields to be used. They are uploaded to the Ignition instance in the form of specifically formatted CSV files | |
| OPC UA Device Connection | This is a list of applications (fields include respective name, slot number, enumeration, revision and type) that are currently installed on a Totalflow device. This list is obtained either by 'auto-discovery' process that takes place on configuration/restart or by importing specifically formatted CSV file | |
| OPC UA Device Connection | Totalflow Applications Definitions (Device) | These are a subset of the global Totalflow Applications Definition files that apply to a specific device |
| OPC UA Device Connection | These are a subset of the global Array-Register definition files that apply to a specific device | |
| OPC UA Device Connection | Array-Register Templates | Array-Register templates are logical groupings of AARs. Generally, Array-Register templates would be created so that instances of them can be used by specifying a poll group with application slot number |
| OPC UA Device Connection | Poll Groups | Poll groups use Array-Register templates in conjunction with application slot number to create a specific groups of register sets (i.e. sets of consecutive array registers) to be polled at a specified poll rate |
The Cirrus Link default Array-Register Definitions and EFM Periodic Mapping files can be used as a starting point for configuring the EFM ABB Totalflow module.
The Totalflow Application Definitions file can be used as an example if you need to add application definitions that are not known to the driver.
There are 12 basic steps to getting all of the data available from an ABB Totalflow into Ignition
From the EFM ABB Totalflow Settings, define/upload the global Array-Register definitions available for all Totalflow devices in this Ignition instance
From the EFM ABB Totalflow Settings, define/upload the global Totalflow applications definitions available for all Totalflow devices in this Ignition instance.
Navigate to the 'Array-Register Templates' configuration panel. If 'Auto-Generate Templates and Poll Group' is enabled, verify the default templates are added to this device definition. If this configuration option is disabled, manually import the templates that apply.
One default Array-Register template will be created per each application type (i.e. application enumeration) given that polling for at least one instance of this application type is enabled in the 'Totalflow Applications' panel.
If there are no enabled applications at the time auto-discovery runs for the first time, no Array-Register templates will be created.
If there are enabled applications but there are no Array-Register definitions applied to this device connection, or definitions that are applied have no applicable entries based of application enumeration; in this case, Array-Register templates will be created but those templates will have no entries. If applicable Array-Register definitions are added later, templates will be populated.
At this point, the ABB Totalflow device should be fully configured. To view data in Ignition launch Ignition Designer and open the OPC Tag Browser as shown below. You should see the tags being polled from the ABB Totalflow device as shown below. You can use these tags as any standard OPC tags in Ignition.
This section will describe how to use default Array-Register templates to generate custom templates and poll groups.
For the purpose of this exercise, lets assume that we only want to poll the AGA3-1 application, and we are interested in 'Current Values' and 'Fixed Analysis' data points only. Here is how to do it:
To view record data which includes ABB Totalflow alarms, events, and history data you must have MQTT Transmission installed on the instance with the EFM ABB Totalflow driver.
In addition, the following must be set up:
At the Central Gateway:
At the Edge Gateway:
OR
For Events and/or History data set the respective poll rates to zero and set the 'Record Info Scan Rate' option to a positive number
Alarms can come from two sources:
PERIODIC_HISTORY_RECORDS - Alarms are obtained from the Log Period records (Array 250) and in this case the 'Alarm Scan Rate' should be set to -1.
ALARM_LOG_RECORDS - Alarms are obtained from only meters with the enhanced option turned on
When all of these conditions are met, alarm, event, and/or history data will be collected, published, and stored via MQTT Recorder in the configured database.
The Array-Register definition archive file may contain lots of INI files - for example, the Array-Register Definitions zip file above contains 1477 files.
So it worth explaining how the ABB Totalflow driver selects which files to parse to create Array_Regsiter Templates. When global Array-Register definitions are applied to a device connection, the driver uses application revision information obtained during the 'auto-discovery' process and selects INI file names that match application revision and variant numbers. As an example, below is application information obtained during the auto-discovery:
Note that since the revision number for the AGA3-1 meter application is 2101306-006, the INI parser will look for the 2101306-006.ini file in submitted ZIP archive.
If no direct match is found, it will look for the another possible match based on the revision number (i.e. 2101306) and revision variant (i.e. 005 and lower).
A user can check what INI files were picked by the driver as a source of Array-Register definitions. This information can be obtained form default Array-Register template generated by the driver by following the 'View INI Files' link as shown below:
Below is an example that shows a portion the 2101306-006.ini file for the AGA3 Tube Application:
[Live Analysis Data] ExtHlp 5000 Help 1171 #Columns=2,Description=300,Value=100
dsc:Last Update from THERMS;cmd:4.5.1;typ:S;rwa:1;
dsc:Last Update from Other Source;cmd:4.2.2;typ:D;rwa:1;
dsc:Heating Value Live @ Tb and Pb;cmd:4.3.45;typ:F;
dsc:Real Relative Density Live @ Tb and Pb;cmd:4.3.44;typ:F;
dsc:N2 Live;cmd:4.3.46;typ:F;
dsc:CO2 Live;cmd:4.3.47;typ:F;
dsc:Methane Live;cmd:4.3.51;typ:F;
dsc:H2S Live;cmd:4.3.48;typ:F;
dsc:H2O Live;cmd:4.3.49;typ:F;
dsc:Helium Live;cmd:4.3.50;typ:F;
dsc:Ethane Live;cmd:4.3.52;typ:F;
dsc:Propane Live;cmd:4.3.53;typ:F;
dsc:N-Butane Live;cmd:4.3.54;typ:F;
dsc:I-Butane Live;cmd:4.3.55;typ:F;
dsc:N-Pentane Live;cmd:4.3.56;typ:F;
dsc:I-Pentane Live;cmd:4.3.57;typ:F;
dsc:N-Hexane Live;cmd:4.3.58;typ:F;
dsc:N-Heptane Live;cmd:4.3.59;typ:F;
dsc:N-Octane Live;cmd:4.3.60;typ:F;
dsc:N-Nonane Live;cmd:4.3.61;typ:F;
dsc:N-Decane Live;cmd:4.3.62;typ:F;
dsc:Oxygen Live;cmd:4.3.63;typ:F;
dsc:Carbon Monoxide Live;cmd:4.3.64;typ:F;
dsc:Hydrogen Live;cmd:4.3.65;typ:F;
dsc:Argon Live;cmd:4.3.66;typ:F;
The ABB Totalflow driver parses selected INI file and uses the info (Array-Register definitions) to generate Array-Register templates as shown below.
Note how highlighted (bold) lines shown above correlate to Array-Register Templates shown below.
Let's look at the 'dsc:N2 Live;cmd:4.3.46;typ:F;' line in more detail. The point description (i.e. N2 Live) is being used as a tag name. The 'typ:F' is the data type (i.e. floating point). Finally, the '4.3.46' defines the AAR (i.e. application, array, and register).
As a result, a default Array-Register Template is generated by the driver for a specific application enumeration, and it contains all Array-Register points found in appropriate INI files.
Additional Resources