Trend Connector

The Trend connector is designed to provide an easy interface to a Trend Building Management System from the FIN Framework.

Each top level connection is to a Trend IQ LAN through a Virtual CNC (VCNC).  Only one VCNC connection per LAN is permitted in each FIN project. 

Each VCNC is restricted to the LAN that the VCNC belongs to (e.g. LAN11).  Performing discovery on a VCNC connection will therefore only return the controllers on it’s local LAN.

Alarms are received through the VCNC.  Therefore only alarm destinations of type IQLAN are supported.  The FIN Alarm extension must also be enabled for alarms to be recorded.

Trend TimeZones can be imported as read-only schedules.  If the FIN Schedule extension is enabled then schedules can be exported as Trend TimeZones by way of scripting.

The following ranges of controllers are supported:

• IQ7x series

• IQ9x series

• IQ1xx series

• IQ2xx series

• IQ3xx series

• IQ4xx series

• IQeco

Traditional current loop controllers should be connected via a VCNC (EINC / IQ4NC etc.).

Standalone controllers must be given a unique LAN number.  They will only be visible through their own VCNC.

IQ4xx series controllers using secure VCNC connections are not currently supported.

Network Requirements

Discovery is performed using UDP broadcast.  VCNCs respond on address 255.255.255.255 port 65534.  Therefore this port must be open for incoming traffic if discovery is to succeed.

Extension

The “Trend” will appear in the list of extensions, from where it can be enabled.

Virtual CNC Discovery

When the extension is enabled, “Trend” will appear as an item in the DB Builder “Connectors” list.

Discover Settings

Available Bind Addresses

Select the address to interrogate.

If the FIN server is connected to more than one network then the discovery process will have to be repeated for each.

The limitation of connecting only one VCNC per LAN per project is enforced across any number of bind addresses.

Timeout [500ms – 30sec]

The value given here is both how long to wait for the initial response to the discovery request, and how long to wait after the most recent valid response before assuming all controllers have responded.

If not all of the expected controllers are found, try increasing this value and repeat discovery.

Discover

Discovery is performed using UDP broadcast. 

If VCNCs are already in-use by other than this FIN server this will significantly delay the discovery process.

A list of all the discovered VCNCs that are not known to be in use elsewhere is returned. 

Only one VCNC per LAN should be added.  If a duplicate is added then it will not be enabled.

Be careful not to do Point Discovery on the added VCNC.  The process will return points that lack their controller outstation value and therefore will not be usable.

To discover the IQ devices on the added VCNC, refresh the browser page, then follow the instructions at Trend IQ Discovery below.

If any point accessible through a VCNC is to be writeable then a PIN is required.  Manually edit the VCNC record to enter the PIN as the Password.

Virtual CNC Manual Definition

dis

Discovered VCNCs have their dis tag set to “Lan n, VCNC m - <device label>”.  For example: “Lan 1, VCNC 101 – First Floor”.

Manually entered VCNCs may use any naming convention.

Password

This is used as the PIN for those devices that have users defined.

An empty value, or a value of “-1” is taken to mean no PIN is defined.

A current limitation is that all devices on the LAN are expected to respond appropriately to the same PIN as it is associated with the VCNC rather than the specific devices.

Uri

Specifies the path to the VCNC.  It has the following format:

trend-tcp://deviceAddress/deviceType/deviceOutstation/vcncPort/vcncOutstation/lan

For example, trend-tcp://192.168.64.121/4/71/10101/101/1

trend-tcp://

Identifies this uri as pertaining to a Trend VCNC.

deviceAddress

The network address of the device where this VCNC is defined.

deviceType

Identifies the IQ series of the device:

• ‘4’ for IQ4xx

• ‘3’ for IQ3xx

• ‘2’ for IQ2xx

deviceOutstation

The outstation number allocated to the device; e.g. 71.

vcncPort

The IP port allocated to this VCNC; e.g. 10101.

vcncOutstation

The outstation number allocated to the VCNC; e.g. 101

lan

The number of the IQLAN this device is connected to; e.g. 1

Trend IQ Discovery

Click the chevron to the left of the VCNC entry in the DB Builder tree to perform a discovery of the devices accessible on the same LAN as the VCNC.

A folder is created under the VCNC definition for each discovered device, with the label of that device.

Point Discovery

Note that only local points are discoverable.  Any available by extended addressing will have to be entered manually.

The following module types are supported as points:

• Analogue Nodes

• Digital Bytes

• Digital Inputs

• Drivers

• Knobs

• Loops

• Sensors

• Switches

• Time Zones

There are two methods of discovering points.

If it is known that a controller has only a few points defined, selecting it’s folder then clicking Discover Points will respond in a reasonable time.  All points of discoverable types will be listed and can be added to an equip as normal.

For controllers with a large number of points defined, each point type can be discovered individually.  Clicking the chevron to the left of the device label will create a folder under that label for each of the discoverable types.  Selecting a point type folder then clicking Discover Points will return only the points of that type.

Point Manual Definition

When defining points manually there are tags specific to the Trend connector. 

All are of type Uri.  All begin with an uppercase ‘L’ for LAN..

They are in the following format: L<deviceLan>/O<deviceOutstation>/<pointId>[/<parameterId>]

For example: L1/O48/S1/$

trendAlarm

A tag used internally to indicate points that can generate alarms.

For example: L1/O48/S1 enables alarms raised by sensor 1 on outstation 48 to be processed.

trendCur

A tag used to refer to the Trend parameter to be used to read a value from a point.

For example: L1/O48/S1/V

trendHis

A tag used to refer to the Trend Plot associated with a point.

For example: L1/O48/S1/P2

trendWrite

A tag used to refer to the Trend parameter to be used to write a value to a point.

For example: L1/O48/S1/v

Writeable Points

Potentially the value of any point can be writeable.  However discovered points are not always marked as such.

Sensors, Digital Inputs, and Drivers are only marked writeable if their Override flag is set to true.

Sensors and Digital Inputs defined as internal can be made writeable by editing their definition to either add or change trendWrite.

Note that if the device has one or more users defined then a PIN is required for writes to have any effect.

Schedule Import

Trend Time Zones can be imported as read-only schedules through point discovery.

Schedule Export

A schedule from the FIN schedule extension can be exported to a Trend Time Zone by sending a ConnMsg to the TrendConn instance for the VCNC connection.

Note that if any users are defined in the target outstation then a PIN will be needed.

id

Always the string “trendTimeZoneSync”.

dis

A human meaningful label.  The label of the time zone in the device is not updated.

For example “Time Zone 2”.

trendTimeZone

Identifies the target outstation and time zone number therein. 

For example:  O48/Z2

scheduleGrid

As output by the FIN schedule extension.

Only “weekday”, “date”, and “dateSpan” are currently supported.

“date” values are given a higher priority than “dateSpan” values.

“dateSpan” ranges must not overlap.

Alarms

Trend outstations must be configured to deliver alarms to the VCNC connection.

Alarms are broadcast to all projects that are connected to the origin LAN.

Destination Type

Only “IQ Lan” is supported.

Message Format

Must be “Text”.

Alarm Address

The outstation number of the VCNC; e.g. 101.

Remote Lan

The LAN number of the destination VCNC.

Known Issues

Release 1.0.5 and later are limited to the Java platform.

The PIN, if entered, is currently associated with the VCNC and is therefore the same for all devices accessible through it.

The IQ discovery process is restricted to the VCNC’s local LAN.

Device discovery is significantly delayed if any VCNCs on the local LAN are in-use by other than this FIN server.

IQ4xx series controllers using secure VCNC connections are not supported.

When sources have more than one Trend Plot associated with them, only one is assigned to the trendHis tag.  This will be, in order of selection:

• the shortest interval periodic plot

• the first discovered trigger plot

• the shortest period synchronized plot.