Application Architect overview

The Application Architect is a tool to structure part or all of an application (project) by designing and instantiating templates. A template is a representation of a real world object in terms of PcVue configuration elements. Templates (and instances thereof) can include:

• Configuration elements
  • Variables
    • Bit
    • Register
    • Text
    • Variable behaviors
      • Trends
        • HDS
        • Proprietary
        • ODBC
        • Free
      • Event
        • Program
        • E-mail
      • Expression
      • Alarm synthesis
      • Threshold
      • Chronometer
      • Counter
      • Discrepancy
      • Alarm behavior
        • Acknowledgement transmission
        • Program action
        • Window action
        • Masking by variable
        • Masking by expression template
      • IEC 104 outstation datapoint
    • HMI Variables
  • Cyclic actions
  • File objects
    • File
    • File item
    • Attribute

  • Associated labels

  • Archive units
    • Database
    • Proprietary
    • ODBC
    • Free
    • Vcr
  • Log list
    • Database
    • Proprietary
    • ODBC
    • Free
  • Data export
    • Log page
    • Trend page
  • Communication
    • Equipment
      • Network
      • Device
      • Frame
    • SNMP
      • Network
      • Unmanaged device
      • SNMP device
      • Polling group
    • BACnet
      • Device
      • Log
      • Notification Class
      • Calendar
      • Schedule
    • OPC
      • OPC server
      • OPC group
      • OPC XML-DA server
      • OPC XML-DA group
    • IEC 60870-5
      • Network
      • Device
      • Sector
    • IEC 61850
      • Device
      • Monitoring object
        • Dataset
        • Data report
        • Data group
    • DNP3
      • Network
      • Device
  • Geographical data
    • Geo-tags
    • Zones
      • Actions
• Graphic elements
  • Mimics
  • Graphic symbols

A template can represent anything from a simple on-off switch to a complete process plant.

The object-oriented approach of templates encourages and helps the developer to structure applications in a way that makes modification and maintenance much easier and quicker. Templates can be stored in a library so they can be reused in many applications thereby significantly reducing configuration time.

An application can be designed using a mix of configuration elements created by the Application Architect, the Application Explorer and Smart Generators. Configuration elements can even be created via the Application Architect and modified using the Application Explorer.