Overview – Data Route
In the OAS Platform, Tags can be configured with a Data Source parameter to read data from and write data to devices, other Tags, a calculation or other sources. Each Tag can only have one Data Source. This ensures the one-to-one relationship between the data source and its representation as a Tag. The Value parameter of the Tag will, and should, always match the latest state of its Data Source, or at least the last known source value.
However, there are situations where we want to have a Tag with one Data Source for reading data, but then also write this data to another Data Source type. For example, we might want to convert Modbus to Allen Bradley or read a Database Tag and write this using Siemens. We might even want to create a Modbus RTU to TCP bridge or create some intermediate Calculation Tags to do data processing and conversion. As mentioned previously, we can’t create one Tag to represent two Data Sources. We could create two Tags, one to represent the data being read and the other to represent the data being written, but then how do we make one Tag write to the other Tag?
This is where the Data Route feature comes in. The Data Route feature allows you to independently configure Tag-to-Tag targets and multi-Tag-to-Tag rules for the purpose of copying data between two tags. This is the perfect solution for moving data between Tags and it can be used to move data between Tags on the same OAS instance or to move data between local Tags and Tags on a remote OAS instance. As already alluded to before, the Data Route feature is great for protocol conversion, moving data between OT and IT networks using triggering rules, dynamically controlling data flow and creating redundancy architectures.
Data Route Types
There are three different types of Data Route configurations that you can use. Let’s look at a high level overview of each. You can follow the links in each section to go into more detail.
Tag-to-Tag
The Tag-to-Tag Data Route is applied at the individual Tag level. It allows you to point a Tag to any other local or remote Tag. A Tag can only have one Data Route target Tag. This type of Data Route is good for simple requirements where you just need to copy one or more Tag to another set of Tags with a one-to-one relationship. Any data writes on the source Tag will be written to the target Tag.
👉 To find out more: Tag to Tag – Data Route 🔗
Multiple Tags
The Multiple Tags Data Route allows you to create groups of Tag-to-Tag or source-destination pairs. Unlike the Tag-to-Tag method, which is applied at the individual Tag level, the Multiple Tags method is an independent configuration construct where individual Tag source-destination pairs are grouped together into Routes. Each route can be dynamically enabled or disabled by using the state of another tag and the trigger for copying data can be chosen based on your requirements. For example, you can have a Route that continuously copies data at a given rate, or one that copies data based on a rising or falling trigger, or one that copies data only if the source or destination changes. This is much more powerful than the Tag-to-Tag method and opens the door to many different use cases.
👉 To find out more: Multiple Tags – Data Route 🔗
IoT Publish
The IoT Publish method is a method that is defined at the driver level. As the name suggests, it applies to the message based IoT protocols such as MQTT, AWS IoT, Azure IoT and Kafka. Each of these drivers allows you to select a list of tags that should be monitored and published based on a configurable trigger condition. This method allows you to publish Tags to Cloud providers without having to create a second set of Tags. It is great for creating a bridge between protocols such as Modbus, OPC UA/DA, Siemens, Allen Bradley and MT Connect and Cloud providers such as AWS, Azure or other internal or third party systems that use MQTT or Kafka brokers.
👉 To find out more: IoT Publish – Data Route 🔗