Recently, a large manufacturer of raw materials for the power generation industry needed to accomplish what would seem to be a relatively straightforward task – to gather comprehensive temperature and humidity data across facilities where vacuum furnaces operate to harden materials. Maintaining relatively stable humidity and temperature is important in this facility, as large fluctuations can adversely affect the equipment and create an inhospitable working environment for personnel. Added to this is the fact that this facility has large arrays of shipping and receiving bays which, if opened concurrently, can result in substantial influxes of humid outside air, drastically altering the temperature and humidity of the facility.
Upon consulting with Software Toolbox, the engineer discovered that an OPC Server for consuming RESTful JSON web services was soon to be available that would easily facilitate consuming the required data in real-time and exposing it to their Wonderware® software via OPC. Over the course of several months, the engineer worked closely with Software Toolbox technical support and development partner, ConneXSoft GmbH, to successfully implement an updated proof-of-concept using the OPC Server for JSON and the AVTECH unit to bring real-time temperature and humidity data into Wonderware.