The Outstation Form for Kingfisher Remote Outstations includes a Remote tab.
Use the Remote tab to specify a Remote outstation’s ‘Parent’ outstation, the type of communications that the Remote outstation uses, and whether a Confidence Scan is required.
- Parent Outstation—Use this field to specify the Master outstation with which this Remote outstation communicates. The Master outstation polls the Remote outstations with which it is associated and passes the polled data onto the ClearSCADA server (see Master and Remote Outstations).
Use the browse button adjacent to the Parent Outstation field to display a Reference browse window. Select the required Master outstation from the window.
- PSTN—Use this check box to specify the type of communications used by the Remote outstation.
Select the check box if the Remote outstation uses a PSTN link to communicate with its Master outstation. ClearSCADA will not attempt to communicate directly with the Remote outstation. Any control requests from ClearSCADA are proxied through the Master outstation. The Master outstation sends confirmation to ClearSCADA on receipt of an acceptable control request, but ClearSCADA does not receive any confirmation that the control has executed successfully.
Clear the check box if the Remote outstation uses a multidrop permanent connection to communicate with its Master outstation. For certain requests, such as when ClearSCADA is starting communications or sending a control request, ClearSCADA will communicate directly with the Remote outstation. This is done in order to ascertain that such a request is executed successfully. To retrieve point data from a Remote outstation, ClearSCADA scans the Master outstation and retrieves the Master outstation’s copy of the Remote outstation’s data.
- Never Read Remote Directly—Select this check box to set the Kingfisher driver so that it will not read data (such as module status information) directly from the Remote outstation. Instead, the driver obtains Remote outstation data from the Master outstation.
Clear the check box if the Kingfisher driver is to read certain data directly from the Remote outstation. Such data typically includes module status information that allows ClearSCADA to ascertain whether the Remote outstation is online. ClearSCADA also contacts the Remote directly on driver start-up.
Regardless of the status of the Never Read Remote Directly check box, the Kingfisher driver will:
- Send control requests directly to the Remote outstation
- Retrieve a Remote outstation’s point data by reading the registers in the Master outstation.
- Confidence Scan Interval—The Kingfisher driver scans any Master outstations regularly for updates to the Remote outstations’ data. When the driver detects that a Master outstation has recovered new data from its Remote outstations, the driver recovers the data from that Master outstation.
Use the Confidence Scan Interval field to specify an interval at which the Kingfisher driver recovers the Master outstation’s copy of the Remote outstation’s data, even if that data has not changed.
Enter a suitable scan interval in the OPC Time Format, for example 5M for five minutes.
Specify zero if a Confidence scan is not required.