Simple Procedure For Adding Digital Tags to FactoryTalk Historian

Simple Procedure
For
Adding Digital Tags to
FactoryTalk Historian
Contents
Procedure Requirements .............................................................................................................................. 3
Reason why you may need to do this procedure ......................................................................................... 3
Procedure...................................................................................................................................................... 3
Add Historian Tag...................................................................................................................................... 3
FactoryTalk Tag Browser ........................................................................................................................... 4
Using Excel SMT Add-In ............................................................................................................................ 7
Using Excel to Create a New Tag............................................................................................................... 8
Copy the tag to another worksheet ...................................................................................................... 9
Copy Row One of the list to the other worksheet ................................................................................ 9
On the imported list Filter on Pointtype for Digital .............................................................................. 9
Copy a Digital tag to the other worksheet ............................................................................................ 9
Copy the New Tag Name tag to the Digital Tag .................................................................................. 10
Edit the Bit address of the New Digital Tag ........................................................................................ 10
Copy the Intrumenttag to the new Digital Tag .................................................................................. 11
Edit the Bit Address of the New Digital Tag ........................................................................................ 11
Delete the Holding tag ........................................................................................................................ 11
Using SMT Export the tag to FTH ........................................................................................................ 12
Tips and Tricks ............................................................................................................................................. 13
This document is a procedure on how to add digital tags to FTHistorian – which will be referred to as
FTH.
Procedure Requirements
Access to a running FTH Server
Access to Excel – in this case I am using Excel 2007 – the basic procedure is the same regardless of the
Excel version
Access to SMT Add-in to Excel
Reason why you may need to do this procedure
FTH has the ability to historize digital tags – which is usually called bits. The issue is that controls
engineers usually use bits in a word – so the FactoryTalk Tag Browser only sees the word address and
does not visualize the word in a (PLC term) radix that is needed. The reason that bits in a word are used
is in CLX terms an entire DINT is use for a single BOOL. In English – an entire 32 bit word is consumed
when a single bit is configured. This can lead to large amounts of memory that is not used.
So it becomes necessary to address bits within a word (BOOL within a DINT) for the Historian to
consume or historize.
Procedure
The following is the procedure that will create a digital tag. We will start at the Add Historian tag – this
comes from a right mouse click in the FactoryTalk Admin Console on an area and an Add Individual
Historian tag is selected.
Add Historian Tag
This is the initial screen that is shown when add Historian tag is selected. Select the correct data
collection interface – in this case FTLD2 and the default scan rate. Note that the number in () is the
number that shows up in Location 4 of the Excel import.
Select Browse Tags
FactoryTalk Tag Browser
Locate the tag that you are interested. In this case it is StepControl.
Use the Add Tag button and the tag is move to the text list. Note that you cannot change the address of
the tag here. In this case the tag is a DINT.
Select OK
Select OK to add the tag to the Historian.
Using Excel SMT Add-In
This will import all of the tags in FTH to the spreadsheet. In this case I am interested only in the Point
Source of FTLD – or the tags that are Rockwell FTLiveData Tags.
Using Excel to Create a New Tag
Now that the tags have been imported into the spreadsheet you now have the configuration of each
FTLD tag in the FTH.
Filter the list and get the one tag that was added.
Copy the tag to another worksheet
Copy Row One of the list to the other worksheet
On the imported list Filter on Pointtype for Digital
Copy a Digital tag to the other worksheet
In the case that you do not have one – use SMT point builder and create one then export the list again –
locate the new tag and copy it to the other worksheet.
Copy the New Tag Name tag to the Digital Tag
Edit the Bit address of the New Digital Tag
Note – in this case the Controller is a CLX – if the controller is a PLC 5 then the separator is a “/” not a “.”
Copy the Intrumenttag to the new Digital Tag
Edit the Bit Address of the New Digital Tag
Delete the Holding tag
Using SMT Export the tag to FTH
Use Create to Create a new Tag
Verify the creation of the new tag
You have now created a digital tag manually using the SMT add-in for Excel.
Note that if you have a standard for Descriptions it would be a good time to do the description prior to
exporting the new tag into FTH.
Tips and Tricks
You should delete the holding tag – unless you need to capture its history as a word. Note that to delete
tags using the SMT Tool you need to enable deletes. This is done by selecting the SMT Add-In and
selecting settings. Then check allow Deletes and then do the export this time deletes will be available.
Warning – Leaving this enabled can lead to deletion of all tags – this can happen since the last selected
choice is retained – so if you reopen the SMT Export dialog again you will see that the delete is the
selected function – not change or edit –
It is recommended to disable deletes after you delete a tag.