Human Machine Interface
Affordable and reliable: standard embedded computing technology for industrial HMIs
GUIs, HMIs and panel PCs require highest graphics performance. If they also need to provide control and IoT gateway functions on a single platform, the specifications become even more demanding: high computing performance, hypervisor support, IoT gateway APIs and extreme reliability are then also required. Yet at the same time devices need to remain affordable. Standardisation enables high volumes across a wide spectrum of applications and also guarantees competitive prices for rugged industrial devices. Martin Frederiksen, sales director Northern Europe at congatec, tells us more
O
n the standard embedded computing technology level, system engineers have two major options: for fastest design-in they can leverage industrial-grade motherboards when the provided standard feature set and extension options are sufficient. For designs with a more dedicated set of interfaces, developers can use computer-on-modules with custom specific carrier boards.
Simple design-in with Mini-ITX Mini-ITX and Pico-ITX boards are suitable industrial-grade motherboard / single board computer (SBC) standards. With a physical footprint of 170 x 170 mm, Mini- ITX presents an ideal balance of small size and rich feature set in a robust construction supported by an extensive ecosystem of accompanying add-ons. The footprint is large enough to accommodate a variety of standard interfaces, extension options and cooling solutions for passive cooling. The maximum height of 20 mm for the "Thin" version enables very flat
housings, required for GUIs/HMIs and panel PCs.
Pico-ITX – when size is crucial Industrial-grade Pico-ITX single board computers offer similar benefits. However, unlike industrial-grade Mini-ITX motherboards, they provide only one mPCIe slot to host standard extension cards for customisation. The second difference is the size. 100 x 72 mm means that Pico-ITX SBCs are 75 per cent smaller than Mini-ITX designs. While the number of interfaces is consequently reduced, all standard interfaces required for GUIs/HMIs are available, including display and sound options as well as Gigabit Ethernet and several USB ports for industrial field bus interfaces. Even GPIOs and serial interfaces are provided.
When choosing a manufacturer of industrial SBCs reliability and long-term availability are important factors. Ideally, they should also be offering good support for customisations such as BIOS/boot screen, special displays or hypervisors and operating systems. This is because GUIs/HMIs have far more individual demands compared to shop-floor panel PCs used for quality control, organisationally driven production planning and control systems. Yet even those need at least a design for 24/7 operation in harsh environments and industrial temperature ranges.
Image 1: The fastest route to industrial HMIs and GUIs: cognate’s latest Thin Mini-ITX motherboards and Pico-ITX SBCs
36 May 2017 Components in Electronics
Customise with computer-on-modules There are several reasons why industrial-grade motherboards and SBCs may
Image 2: Secrets behind the screens: including even a cooling solution at the height of only 20mm, Thin Mini- ITX boards are a perfect fit for slim- line panel PC designs
not be the best choice to build GUIs/HMIs. The size may still be too large, the location or the selection of provided interfaces may not fit, or there may have too
many interfaces – just imagine how many things you can achieve with USB. Most often, it is a mix of all these reasons that makes a custom design necessary. In that case, engineers should pick computer-on- module standards. They deliver a vendor independent, standardised and application ready computing core, thereby making the realisation of individual designs far less time consuming. By utilising computer-on- modules, engineers can also immediately upgrade their designs with the latest processor technology. As an additional benefit, module vendors provide comprehensive driver support plus value adding features such as personal integration support, or standardised application programming interfaces such as IoT gateway APIs for remote management, maintenance and upgrade of distributed systems.
Engineers can pick one of the three
standards available in the market: COM Express, SMARC or Qseven. COM Express is the best choice for the high-end sector, while SMARC is optimised for low-power multimedia designs with several screens. Qseven is dedicated to more embedded and highly cost efficient GUIs/HMIs with low-power x86 and ARM processor implementations including NXP (former Freescale)
i.MX6 processors and their upcoming successors.
Application readiness simplifies development Selecting the proper hardware is only the first step. On top of this, the application readiness is also important. For today’s multifunctional GUI/HMI systems it is important when a board vendor offers a platform that is proven to operate with
hypervisor technology, such as the one from Real-Time Systems, which is ideal for connected robotics, industrial machine controls and medical systems. Such a setup delivers a platform that consolidates the extensive functionality required for real-time control and GUIs/HMIs as well as Industry 4.0 connectivity and IoT gateway functions in a single system. Engineers benefit from application ready and functionally validated real-time platforms that significantly reduce their verification and validation efforts, provide a comprehensive documentation package that is ready for own certifications, and offers personal integration support that does not stop at driver or library settings but delivers the entire real-time capable, virtualisation ready platform.
Integrating cloud connectivity With real-time hypervisor support the GUI and PLC question is addressed. But what about the IoT gateway and Industry 4.0 interfaces? Here additional efforts are required which congatec has addressed by launching its new Cloud API (Application Programming Interface) for IoT Gateways. This new API for IoT gateways communicates with local smart sensors, processes and converts the acquired data and executes automated actions based on a local rule engine, reducing traffic to the IoT cloud and enabling fast local actions. Secure bidirectional data exchange with any suitable clouds is achieved by using the TLS secured MQTT protocol. Clients can access this cloud via https in client or administrator mode. All these features make the new congatec Cloud API for IoT Gateways an ideal starting point for OEMs that need to deliver machine data via IoT gateways and IoT edge servers. The new congatec Cloud API impresses with its built-in openness to integrate a broad range of wireless sensor interconnects, including Bluetooth LE, ZigBee, LoRa and other LPWANs, as well as wired protocols for building or factory automation via one single cloud API. Even heterogeneous protocol configurations and communication with other gateways are possible. Together, these benefits enable engineers to most efficiently exploit the full congatec multi-core embedded board and computer-on-module range, from Intel Atom, Celeron and Pentium processors (codename Apollo Lake) up to Intel Core processors (codename Kaby Lake) and AMD G-Series and R-Series, for their various applications.
www.congatec.com www.cieonline.co.uk
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