Configuring the interface with the PI Interface Configuration Utility

The PI Interface Configuration Utility (PI ICU) provides a graphical user interface for configuring PI interfaces. If the interface is configured by the PI ICU, the batch file o the interface (PIOPCAE.bat) will be maintained by the PI ICU and all configuration changes will be kept in that file and the module database. The procedure below describes the necessary steps for using PI ICU to configure the PI OPCAE interface.

Note: PI ICU requires PI 3.3 or greater.

From the PI ICU menu, select Interface, then NewWindows Interface Instance from EXE..., and then Browse to the PIOPCAE.exe executable file. Then, enter values for Host PI Server/Collective, Point Source and Interface ID#. A window such as the following results:

“Interface name as displayed in the ICU (optional)” will have PI- pre-pended to this name and it will be the display name in the services menu.

Click on Add.

The following display should appear:

Note that in this example the Host PI Data Server is INT-NODE1-STS. To configure the interface to communicate with a remote PI Data Server, select ‘Interface => Connections…’ item from PI ICU menu and select the default server. If the remote node is not present in the list of servers, it can be added.

After the interface is added to PI ICU, near the top of the main PI ICU screen, the Interface Type should be OPCAE. If not, use the drop-down box to change the Interface Type to be OPCAE.

Click on Apply to enable the PI ICU to manage this copy of the PI OPCAE interface.

The next step is to make selections in the interface-specific tab (i.e. “OPCAE”) that allow the user to enter values for the startup parameters that are particular to the PI OPCAE interface.

Since the PI OPCAE interface is a UniInt-based interface, in some cases the user will need to make appropriate selections in the UniInt page. This page allows the user to access UniInt features through the PI ICU and to make changes to the behavior of the interface.

To set up the interface as a Windows Service, use the Service page. This page allows configuration of the interface to run as a service as well as to starting and stopping of the interface. The interface can also be run interactively from the PI ICU. To do that go to menu, select the Interface item and then Start Interactive.

For more detailed information on how to use the above-mentioned and other PI ICU pages and selections, refer to the PI Interface Configuration Utility User Manual. The next section describes the selections that are available from the OPCAE page. Once selections have been made on the PI ICU GUI, press the Apply button in order for PI ICU to make these changes to the interface’s startup file.