Harry Forbes

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Embedded Virtualization in Process Automation Systems

Multicore processors enable a server’s software stack to be replicated in an embedded system, bringing virtualization benefits to process automation.

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FDT Provides Factory Fieldbus Flexibility

FDT-enabled applications within the automation system can manage field devices regardless of the device’s manufacturer, and regardless of the fieldbus protocol employed.

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Wireless Sensing Benefits from New Technology and Standards

Looking at the changes in wireless sensor networking (WSN) during the past year, ARC is most impressed by the greater maturity of the industry along with significant new technical achievements. We believe that both will spur market growth because they enable a much larger set of customers to be well served.

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ZigBee Moves From Monogamy To Polygamy

In its early days, ZigBee networking was the ZigBee Alliance’s core technology.

More from Harry Forbes

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Equipment Condition Monitoring Goes Wireless

Equipment condition monitoring (ECM) for rotating equipment is a well-established field that is decades old.

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Coping with Higher-Priced Energy

New and less-expensive technologies for electric-power measurement using wireless mesh networks should be on the market in the near future.

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Lower-power Bluetooth

Low power consumption is a critical product differentiator for all types of battery-powered wireless devices.

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Performing Without a Net

The largest single barrier to the wider deployment of wireless devices at the sensor level is that they have no standard network layer protocol. This is not just a typical emerging market issue that can be remedied by a few new standards.

Nuclear Batteries for Wireless Sensors

Electric power supply is the single most difficult constraint for industrial wireless sensor design. Present-day commercial products rely on chemical batteries.

Applications Dictate Wireless Sensor Solutions

The use of wireless sensors in wellhead monitoring of oil and gas fields is a key application that shows promise. The measurements involved are conventional process measurements of pressure, level and flow using a small number of wireless measurements on each well.

Getting physical with industrial ethernet

The old gag goes that, “The best thing about designing your products to standards is that you can choose from so many.” Even in the case of the most long-lived technologies, worldwide convergence to a single standard does not occur once multiple standards become entrenched in geographic or vertical market segments.