The trend system can help you better understand your plant and equipment's performance. Trending can be used for dynamic visual analysis (trend and SPC graphs), production records, or for regularly recording the status of equipment for efficiency and preventive maintenance.
Using trend tags, you can specify the data you want to collect from your I/O Device variables. This information can be logged at regular intervals (periodic trendA trend that is sampled continuously at a specified period. You can also define a trigger (an event) to stop and start the trend (when a specified condition occurs in the plant).), or only when an event occurs (event trend). Event trends are used for trending data that is not time-based, for example, for a product as it comes off an assembly line. Trend data is usually saved on disk for analysis or displayed on a trend graph or in Process Analyst.
The trend system is based on real-time samples. The trend system expects a return of one data point each time it samples the data. Although gaps in the data can be filled, you will want to verify that your field device can return data values at the rate you specify (especially if you are using sample periods of less than 100 ms).
Any amount of data can be collected and stored. The only restriction on the amount of data that you can store is the size of the hard disk on your computer (an efficient data storage method is used to optimize the use of storage space on your computer's hard disk).
By default, Citect SCADA stores trend files in the [DATA] directory (defined by the parameter
For example, if your system includes a large number of trend tags (in excess of 1000), Citect SCADA will perform more efficiently if you distribute the associated trend files across a number of directories. To enable this, you could set the File Name property for a trend tag to the following:
[DATA]:Area1\TANK131
This would store the trend file in a subdirectory (named "Area1") within the [DATA] directory.
For long term storage, you can archive the data to disk or a removable drive (without disrupting your runtime system).
Note: If you are trending data across a network (distributed processingFor large applications with large amounts of data, you can distribute the data processing to reduce the load on individual computers.), it is recommended that you enable time synchronization using the Time Synchronization configuration application. This verifies that every trend is synchronized to
This section covers the following information:
Published June 2018