The news release below popped up in my mailbox this week.

 "Take Off With ALA” This January to Palm Springs, CA for LabAutomation2009
Innovative Collaboration Designed to Maintain Momentum and Success of the
Annual Conference and Exhibition Despite Difficult Economic Times
 
CHICAGO – The Association for Laboratory Automation (ALA), a multi-disciplinary, non-profit scientific society serving diverse industries and technology sectors, announces a new mission-centric program intended to diminish the financial impact of rising travel costs on individuals interested in participating in the organization’s annual conference and exhibition, LabAutomation2009, January 24-28, Palm Springs, CA, USA. 
 
The unprecedented “Take Off With ALA” discount program provides $200 off airfare for the first 500 airline tickets purchased by full-conference paid registrants for the LabAutomation2009 conference and exhibition. This discount applies to any airline available through the LabAutomation2009 Travel Desk.  ALA guidelines, policies and disclaimers apply.  Visit labautomation.org for complete details.

Cool!  Trade shows in general have fallen on hard times. We know the reasons: the Internet, tighter budgets, less time, crummy travel, etc. Good to see these folks taking some creative steps to keep the folks coming. It'll be interesting to see how well the strategy works. Maybe other organizations will adopt similar strategies.    

From the press release I just received from Chuck Harrell:

Advantech Wins 10th Place at Top Taiwan Global Brands 2008
 
(Cincinnati, Ohio – 10/30/08) – Global IPC and eAutomation facility and service leader Advantech won 10th place in the 2008 Top Taiwan Global Brands survey, with a brand value of $299 million.  The company was also recognized for its sixth straight years of steady brand value growth, evidence of increasing global image stature and stronger brand competitiveness.
 
Focused Leadership
The top Taiwan Global Brands Survey is organized by the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) and co-organized by BusinessNext and Interbrand.  Advantech was the only IPC maker in Taiwan to advance to the top 10 rankings, manifesting Advantech’s many years of effort in expediting corporate internationalization and refining its brand image.
 
Advantech’s CEO, KC Liu notes that, “Twenty-five years since its inception, Advantech has well become the leader in the global IPC market.  Advantech has unwaveringly embraced its corporate philosophy of offering Trusted ePlatform Services and its commitment of resources and passions to the IPC field is crucial in setting the pace for Advantech’s global leadership.  In recent years, Advantech has intensified endeavors to polish its branding framework, with focused leadership setting the tone to pioneer the market and scale new heights with the company’s niche-centric leadership and execution-minded staff.”
 
Service-Oriented Customer Partnership
Interbrand, a renowned branding consulting company, forecasts a bright future for Advantech as the company has shifted directions from a “product-oriented” approach to a “service-oriented” business development strategy.  Advantech’s devotion to providing innovative ePlatform products and services promises to position the company as a most-trustworthy business ally for every customer.  Lastly, Advantech’s global branding network in 18 countries and 39 cities facilitates the speediest time-to-market services and support to its clients around the world.  These business tenets have decidedly paid dividends in Advantech’s illustrious brand position.
 
To meet the demands of a fast-growing knowledge economy, Advantech is introducing an Open Business Model to determine its future organizational and operational direction, and will continue to drive its core business growth engine to further advance its established leadership in the IPC and eAutomation niche market.  These executive decisions will safeguard a solid cornerstone for Advantech’s sustainable future operation and an ever-improving global brand position.

Bela Liptak, intrepid cat herder, titled this "Co-authors at work," but we can see that this is clearly a failure of the basic process control system. His previous experience herding dampers at IBM's world headquarters building, and his teaching experience at Yale and all his management experience to the contrary, Bela is clearly now controlled by three kittens, rather than being "in control." This allows me to tell you that we are going to introduce a new blog, called "Out of Control" in the next few weeks, which will focus on the lighter side of automation and control. Contributions are welcome...

MoreCatsLiptak

Be afraid, be very afraid...and pay attention, Grasshopper! Here's a book review that is sorta out of everybody's field. I think you should all read it. It puts into perspective what we are all trying to prevent. I just finished reading a monograph (a nearly 300 page monograph, at that) by an online friend, Chuck Stewart, who is an emergency medicine physician. The monograph is Weapons of Mass Casualties and Terrorism Response Handbook, by Charles Stewart MD, FACEP, published under the auspices of the American Academy of Orthopedic Physicians by Jones and Bartlett Publishers (ISBN 0-7737-2425-4). You can buy the book at Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Casualties-American-Orthopaedic-Surgeons-Monograph/dp/0763724254/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1218408387&sr=8-1. Here's the review I just posted on Amazon: Although I write science fiction, and help edit two science fiction magazines, my day job is as editor of a major technical publication...Control magazine (www.controlglobal.com). I have been studying this subject from the other direction...from the direction of the terrorist attack on the control systems of critical infrastructure industries. Chuck Stewart's book is an absolutely terrifying look at what might happen if one of those attacks, or God forbid, more than one of those attacks might succeed. As you might expect, some of the deep medical content is over my head...I am an engineering type, not a medical type, but some of it isn't. If you are interested in the security of the critical infrastructure of the world, you ought to take a short detour through Chuck's book. What happens if terrorists (foreign or the home-grown variety) blow up a refinery, and then do a poison gas attack on the responders and victims? Chuck knows, and lays it all out in his book. This book is highly recommended for any serious researcher in safety and security, for anyone who works and manages in the critical infrastructure industries, for government types like DHS and FBI, and of course, for the medical professionals Chuck wrote it for.

 I am pleased to report the publication of the 3rd edition of Foundation Fieldbus by Ian Verhappen and Augusto Pereira. This volume, which I have read in a pre-publication version, is expanded and improved, with new information published since the 2nd edition, and is vastly improved over the 1st edition published backalong. New Foundation Fieldbus book by Verhappen and Pereira: Foundation Fieldbus 3rd Edition by Ian Verhappen and Augusto Pereira

This is an invaluable single-volume desk reference on Foundation Fieldbus. If you have, or are planning to have a Foundation Fieldbus network in your plant, you should immediately buy and read this book. 

Here's the text of ISA's press release announcing this book:

The first edition of this handy resource book was published by ISA, in the United States in 2002 it quickly became a best seller, raising awareness of how to install and implement digital communications with the FF protocol. It was also the first ISA book to be published in three languages (English, Spanish and Portuguese).

This 3rd edition updates the previous editions with increased coverage of: HSE, Safety Instrumented Function, EDDL and FDT/DTM; FF Power Conditioners, Field Device Couplers and Physical Layer Components; Diagnostic and Maintenance Tools; Earthing and Grounding; and Asset Management.

Available in October 2008, the 3rd edition can be purchased through the ISA web site at http://www.isa.org/Template.cfm?Section=Books3&Template=/customsource/isa/StoreIntro/books.cfm

The authors, Augusto Pereira (Brazil) and Ian Verhappen (Canada), are renowned engineers who became experts in Foundation Fieldbus technology as they have been involved in its development since 1994.

First the other news:  This popped up in the email a couple of hours ago:

"Siemens Energy & Automation, Inc. announced today that exiderdome’s stop in Charlotte will be cancelled.  After successful stops in four U.S. cities and nearly 5,000 visitors, exiderdome cannot be transferred from a barge to land for the second half of its U.S. tour, due to legal disputes involving key logistics suppliers. The company is currently exploring options for rescheduling the visit to Charlotte after exiderdome’s stop in Houston."

A call to Siemens hasn't yet revealed anything more about the nature of the dispute. But Siemens has to want this settled fast. It's spent a lot of time and money on the exiderdome--and by all accounts, it's been money well spent so far. It would be a shame to have the plan messed up by a "legal dispute." 

Of course, I suppose that's better than being grabbed by pirates, but still.  

Now, back to Nashville. Rockwell's p.r. folks have been peppering our mailboxes with tons of news.  Two items of interest relate to Rockwell's forays into the "Innerwebs." How 'bout Web-based HMI?

"Rockwell Automation Launches Web-HMI
In the same way that sports fans use Internet-capable devices to get up-to-the-minute information about their favorite teams, manufacturers can now remotely monitor the plant-floor operations status using FactoryTalk ViewPoint software from Rockwell Automation. FactoryTalk ViewPoint software is the one of the first commercially available, thin-client applications for manufacturing built using the new Microsoft Silverlight technology. The initial release extends visualization and real-time decision capabilities beyond FactoryTalk View clients to browser-based remote users.

FactoryTalk ViewPoint software supports fully scalable and animated Web displays of existing FactoryTalk View Site Edition (SE) and Allen-Bradley PanelView Plus applications from the office, home or on the road via any Internet browser. While the initial release is Internet Explorer (IE) compatible, additional browser and device support is planned. IE’s active hyperlinks and the navigational functionality deliver an interactive experience in addition to typical browser functionality such as favorites, and forward and back navigation buttons.

FactoryTalk ViewPoint software was developed using Microsoft Silverlight technology – the same technology used by NBC to air videos of the Olympics online. Silverlight is a cross-browser, cross-platform plug-in for delivering rich, interactive applications on multiple Web browsers and mobile devices. The plug-in loads and updates automatically, making it easier for users, while lowering the total cost of ownership as there is no client software to install or maintain."

Then, to add to RA's webby goodness, this release followed about five minutes later:

"Rockwell Automation today launched Rockwell Software FactoryTalk VantagePoint, an innovative addition to its FactoryTalk Integrated Production and Performance Suite that allows end users to self-configure rich Web-based dashboards, trends and reports without expensive, time-consuming support resources. FactoryTalk VantagePoint software leverages the FactoryTalk service-oriented architecture and technology acquired through the company’s purchase of Incuity Software to deliver automatic access to valuable production information from both Rockwell Automation and third-party systems in an easier-to-use, cost-effective manner.
 
Through a familiar Internet browser, Microsoft Office user interfaces and pre-defined connectors to third-party systems, FactoryTalk VantagePoint users can install and configure their systems in as little as a few hours with minimal technical support. This immediate access to actionable insight allows employees at every level of a production facility to better monitor and manage productivity, and exercise more control over high-profile operations such as energy efficiency or global supply-chain execution. Providing cohesive access to information on-demand in an intuitive, easier-to-use format improves decision support in any aspect of the manufacturing environment – from inventory to maintenance, production to quality, and up through the enterprise and supply-chain planning."

Oh, and Rockwell also wants us to know that more than 11,000 of the faithful are down in Nashville getting up-close views of this and all the rest of the RA product line--as well as that of their numerous partners.

For more on Automation Fair, check the top of the Controlglobal.com home page for the complete coverage of yesterday's events.  

Where's Walt, some of you have been asking He's not sick, been captured by aliens or anything else horrible. We've just had him on the road, meeting with readers, chatting with advertisers, giving presentations, flying the flag, taking meetings, doing 2009 strategic planning and other editor-in-chiefy things, all have which have left him precious little time for blogging. Right now, he and most of the rest of the Control staff iare down in Nashville, at the annual Rockwell Automation clan gathering, Automation Fair. They are pulling together the 21st-century version of that old trade-show stand-by, the show daily. But being a new century and all, we now do it all with electrons and email copies to readers, thereby saving tons of trees. Such work does, however, require some back-up at home; hence, digital managing editor, Katherine Bonfante, and I are back here at the home pop-stand, keeping the electrons flying, the coffee pot on and the fire burning. I miss Automation Fair. Rockwell gives good user group. But since Walt has left me the keys to the blogging machine, I'm going to take it out for a spin.

One of the good things about being left behind, so to speak, is that Katherine and I get to see all the best news out of Nashville before anybody else. One of the subjects under the microscope at Manufacturing Perspectives, the pre-show all-day press briefing, was sustainability. Mark Lee of Coca Cola cut right to the chase. It's not just about being green, he said. Sustainability is "really just good business practice." For the complete story, click here.

But wait! There's more! The press got a run-down on Rockwell Automation's new roadmap for its process automation "umbrella," PlantPAx. For the details, click here.  For even more details on Plant PAx, go here.

That's all for now, folks. But there will be more tomorrow. Don't miss the next exciting episode.

From the press release from the Automation Standards Compliance Institute, an ISA company:

NIST Collaborates with ISA100 Wireless Compliance Institute to Validate ISA100.11a Draft Standard

Research Triangle Park, NC (10 November 2008) -- As part of its ongoing effort to assure the usefulness of the ISA100.11a Industrial Wireless Standard, the ISA100 Wireless Compliance Institute (WCI) is collaborating with NIST on a Validation Study to independently perform simulations of network performance characteristics using data from early adopters of the Standard. The Validation Study will analyze performance data and determine if the real world works as simulated.

This initiative provides a way of validating certain performance dimensions of the ISA100.11a Standard itself during the early stages of adoption by the industrial automation controls community. In addition, the study supports one of the key goals of the WCI: to provide field tested feedback to the ISA100 Standards Committee for ensuring that the standard meets its intended objectives with satisfactory performance characteristics.

The Validation Study expects to provide insights beneficial to suppliers who are launching new products based on the ISA100.11a technology and to operators who are investing in the deployment and management of these leading edge technologies.

The general approach is to encourage early adopters to make performance data available to the study effort under appropriate confidentiality protections. The data will be analyzed to determine if the real world works as simulated. If it doesn’t, everyone involved will be interested in determining why and seek solutions for closing the gap and improving the Standard.

Jay Werb, WCI’s Technical Director, commented, "WCI can test products and prove that they conform to the ISA100.11a Industrial Standard, but sooner rather than later, someone needs to prove that the Standard actually works on a realistic scale."

"We are currently planning a rigorous user-site beta test battery that is primarily aimed at validating the interoperability of ISA100.11a technologies in a heterogeneous vendor environment," said Herman Story of Shell Global Solutions. "However, we still need the Validation Study to validate performance in a scaled-up real world environment."

Companies are encouraged to participate in the Validation Study and interested parties should contact Andre Ristaino, ASCI Managing Director, for details at

Next up was a series of five minute "commercials" from Carl's Solution Partners. It was interesting to note that the only one of the Big Six automation companies present was Siemens, and the Wonderware Mobile Solutions division of Invensys. One wonders if the listing of automation so far down in Hermann Ortega's list would happen if the big automation providers attended PlantSuccess. Even Honeywell Process Solutions, Ortega's solution partner and sister company, was absent from the sponsor list.

Charlie Mohrmann, from Wonderware Mobile Solutions, said of PlantSuccess, "PlantSuccess gives us high-level contacts in a setting that focuses the customer on problems we help solve and the context to demonstrate our value proposution. Industry leaders seeking business conversations with decision makers and innovative suppliers should participate as a sponsor, speaker or attendee; you will enjoy the event, learn about trends, and open new opportunities for your company."

PlantSuccess' solution partners are:

actenum

aveva

innotec

Johnson Controls

meridium

Siemens Energy and Automation

Wonderware Mobile Solutions, an Invensys company