Press Room

Starthis Announces iTapestry Version 3.0 – Services Oriented Architecture for Industrial Automation

New SOA Production Control Suite Completes the SOA Efforts
Already Underway Across CRM, SCM, and ERP

ORLANDO, FL (February 22, 2006) - Starthis, the leading provider of fully compliant Services Oriented Architectures for industrial automation, today announced the latest release of its productivity solution suite, iTapestry. The iTapestry suite of SOA elements increases production capacity and availability by reducing errors and accelerating exception handling. By making vital real-time production information available to all key decision-makers across the enterprise – planners, customer service, logistics, executive management – iTapestry enables them to make the fast, informed decisions, necessary in this new world of demand driven production.

The iTapestry 3.0 suite includes:

• iTapestry J2EE/J2SE Middleware – SOA compliant internally and externally; an industrial automation middleware providing SCADA, Open Process Control, Historian, and Data Acquisition functionality on an enterprise connectivity basis, with the future extensibility inherent in a Services Oriented Architecture.
• Communication Manager , Device Manager, and Messaging Manager – Robust SOA compliant ‘services’ managers enabling seamless integration with all J2EE Application Server Architectures by automatically utilizing these ‘services’ when available within a J2EE environment and providing them when not available
• EtherNet/IP Connector; iTapestry Modbus TCP Connector – fully compliant implementations of the two leading industrial networking protocols, EtherNet/IP, and Modbus TCP, including full support of all four communication classes within the EtherNet/IP specification as well as solicited and unsolicited messaging.
• Device Beans – fully EJB compliant PLC ‘logic and tag’ aware device managers
• Rockwell Automation – ControlLogix Device Bean
• Rockwell Automation – MicroLogix Device Bean
• Rockwell Automation – SLC 5/05 Device Bean
• Stanley Toolworks – Torque Tool Controller Device Bean

• IEC Standards Based Data Library – The IEC data library provides 100% compatibility with the IEC 61131-3 standard for data types. Therefore iTapestry will consistently provide uniform and well defined data presentation no matter which vendors devices are used in the plant. The IT personnel won’t spend time fixing data incompatibility issues, the data library meets all the IEC requirements.
• Java Management Extensions (JMX) – iTapestry has incorporated the latest Java Management Extensions (JMX), which provide sophisticated new utilities to manage and monitor system resources in real-time. The intuitive visual interface provides tools to manage resource usage, system I/O optimization, memory, bandwidth, throughput, and message traffic utilization, maximizing the performance of iTapestry resources enabling data movement at maximum rates. This helps assure that iTapestry will deliver the speed manufacturing management demands while providing the enterprise systems administration tools IT executives require.
• Poller Xpress – an iTapestry Web Application management console which provides Production or IT personnel a simple intuitive interface for the creation of ‘autonomous’ polling agents. Auto discovery of the tags and structure of the PLC polling ‘targets’ is provided and displayed to any browser, with full configuration of which tags to be polled, at what frequency, and on what schedule. The collected data then can be browsed from within Poller Xpress, or exported into any ODBC/JDBC compliant database, JMS/MQ messaging queue. This allows ‘real time’ extraction and delivery of production information for existing Historian, Quality Analysis, Advanced Planning and Scheduling, Bill of Materials requirements without any programming.
• BPEL Exchange – An outgrowth from the Department of Commerce, NIST ATP project currently underway, the iTapestry BPEL Exchange Web Application provides direct connectivity with the major Business Process Execution Language (BPEL) Engines rapidly coming to market – Oracle, BEA, IBM, and a variety of BPM providers as well – enabling the conveyance of ‘business process’ structure and rules from strategic planners to actual production control.
• HMI Builder – ‘Drag and Drop’ display builder which enables non-programming personnel, whether from IT or Production departments, to quickly and easily create their own monitoring and operator control displays using real time plant floor data delivering an accurate status of current production operations. Built with Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG), the run-time operator screens are accessible through any browser throughout the plant or across the enterprise. The symbol library includes all the essential HMI tools including light towers, gauges, meters, stop and start buttons, tag editors, and digital displays. This is the fastest, easiest and least expensive way to provide true real-time monitoring throughout the plant, without writing a line of code.

“While demonstrating the product, a controls engineer commented that once they have access to real-time data, they need to provide the machine operators with real-time monitoring. We responded by developing the new HMI Builder” says Stephan Werges, CTO Starthis

These tools make the jobs of IT and plant floor professionals significantly easier without unacceptable compromises. Finally the IT department has access to real-time data for monitoring, reporting and real-time dashboards for the enterprise executives while the Production operations staff is provided the real time information they need to improve plant efficiency while maintaining safe and secure plant floor operations.

The iTapestry suite is licensed on a per server basis without restriction to the number of simultaneous devices being accessed. In addition, the new HMI Builder module, is licensed on a per server basis rather than a per seat arrangement, providing unlimited access to plant data with a significantly lower investment. Starthis is focused on helping clients make vital production data readily available to all authorized personnel across the enterprise without redundant effort or equipment - from the shop floor to the board room – through a lower cost Services Oriented Architecture.

About Starthis
SERVICES ORIENTED ARCHITECTURE for MANUFACTURING
The Starthis iTapestry architecture provides industrial automation software tools for managing the real-time flow of production information within your plant and across your enterprise. This is the next step in the Services Oriented Architecture evolution occurring within the other major information solutions areas of any corporation today – CRM, SCM, MES, and ERP. The iTapestry suite of productivity tools provide direct access to data, management of data distribution and integration, work-in-process visibility, security, continuous availability, reporting and monitoring, and interactive operator interfaces. This is the best way to make vital real-time information available to all key decision-makers in the enterprise - whether on the ‘shop floor’ or in the ‘executive suite’. Further information about Starthis is available at www.starthis.com.