Announcing the release of InTouch 9.0 with SmartSymbol Technology

Note that customers that have current Premier Support Contracts with Q-mation are entitled to receive their free version upgrades to InTouch 9.0 upon request.  Simply call 215-675-5800 or e-mail us at sales@qmation.com to request your upgrades.

May 27th, 2004 saw the official release of Version 9.0 of Wonderware's InTouch human-machine interface (HMI) software. Version 9.0 of InTouch software innovates with SmartSymbol technology, which offers considerable savings by significantly reducing application engineering, testing and deployment time.  SmartSymbols represent an enormous advancement in the creation, deployment and modification of graphical elements within an application. Using the SmartSymbol Manager, application developers can create templates from graphics that can connect to ArchestrA® Objects, local InTouch tags, and InTouch tags through remote references. These symbol templates are saved in the SmartSymbol Library and can be instantiated by selecting them and dropping them onto an InTouch window.

Any graphic in an InTouch window can be converted into a SmartSymbol simply by right-clicking it. Once created, libraries of SmartSymbols can be exported to other applications and plants, enabling companies to standardize on graphics throughout the entire organization. Once a SmartSymbol instance is deployed, if users need to change an instance, they simply modify the SmartSymbol template and the change automatically propagates throughout the application, to every window in which the SmartSymbol instance is used (a tremendous advantage for validated systems). By using this functionality, users can now easily make changes, upgrades and modifications to applications quickly and easily and without fear of introducing new errors into the system.  Customers will benefit from the ease of template creation, from improved flexibility and from the tremendous time reductions associated with system modifications.

In addition to the new Smart Symbol features, InTouch users can use a new script function called IOSetRemoteReferences to modify the datasource for ArchestrA Objects or InTouch tag references at runtime. This new script enables developers to switch object instances for graphic symbols based on particular conditions or directly via user interaction such as clicking a button (this functionality applies to all standard graphical objects as well as any new SmartSymbols). Users can modify an application’s access name and item name at runtime, greatly increasing the amount of information viewed with minimal application modification. Simply by adding a button to a window and executing a single script, users can opt to view information from different devices, objects, areas and plants at lightning quick speeds.

As expected, InTouch 9.0 software is “Integrated with ArchestrA,” which means that it leverages the integration attributes of ArchestrA technology, enabling increased diagnostics and security capabilities, simplified communications deployment, remote configuration and the unification of devices and networks.  Additionally, version 9.0 offers new features such as scripts that make viewing, creating and analyzing data easier and more efficient. It also enables users to create displays that can be viewed from workstations, PDAs, browsers and the new Wonderware Industrial Tablets and Touch Panel Computers.

InTouch software is an open and extensible HMI that enables flexibility in custom application design with connectivity to the broadest set of automation devices in the industry (InTouch software can connect to several hundred available I/O and OPC® servers that are designed to connect to Wonderware products. This list of I/O servers is longer than that of any other HMI product on the market.).  Wonderware servers provide access to InTouch application data through Microsoft® DDE communications, Wonderware's SuiteLink™ protocol or OPC technology. Third-party developers can use the ArchestrA DAS (data access server) Toolkit to create servers that incorporate one or all of the communication methods listed above. Additionally, the InTouch HMI and Wonderware's other FactorySuite A²™ products are capable of serving as OPC clients or an OPC server.

Wonderware’s InTouch application has received several editorial and user awards since its introduction including being recognized as the industry’s favorite HMI for 10 consecutive years by Control magazine readers as part of its annual “Readers’ Choice Awards.”  To learn more about this powerful new release, please contact Q-mation.  We would be happy to answer all of your questions or demonstrate the functionality of InTouch 9.0.

Please contact your Q-mation Sales Engineer for more information on this significant new release.

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