Pre-analysis and PLC addresses

The panel opens before the last step of the conversion while the Show the pre-analysis before writing option in the Settings step is on (the default). At this point the project has not been written to disk yet.

• For each project the number of pages, objects and tags, the share of tags with a resolved PLC address and the number of warnings.
• The split of exact, approximate and placeholder objects.
• Tags whose address could not be resolved are counted by reason, with how many of them are used on screens or in alarms.

Write project › continues, and Cancel stops without writing anything.

A card opens for every PLC that the project’s tags are bound to: CPU type, firmware version and IP address. The settings are read from the TIA project. If a change has not been downloaded to the PLC, the running PLC may differ.

If the PLC can be reached from this computer, Test connection probes the running PLC: it tries the S7 port (102) and the OPC UA port. Nothing is written to the PLC.

In an optimized data block the variables have no fixed byte address; the S7 driver cannot read these tags. The Connect optimized DB tags via OPC UA option in the Settings step (on by default) moves these tags to an OPC UA connection created for each PLC. The PLC card shows how many tags will be moved, and it can be turned on and off per PLC.

• The connection name ends with the PLC name, such as PLC_1_OPC_UA. The IP address, port, security mode and logon type come from the OPC UA setting in the project.
• The tag address is the node ID written with the data block and member names.
• Tags that cannot be connected are listed with the reason: “Accessible from HMI/OPC UA/Web API” is off for the member, the member is not found, or the type is DTL.

For this connection to work, the OPC UA server and the standard SIMATIC server interface must be on in the CPU and an OPC UA runtime license must be assigned to the CPU. The security mode must be None or Basic256Sha256. With a user name logon, the password is entered on the Live computer. In Studio the connection is an ordinary OPC UA connection.

In the Result step, if there are tags without a PLC address, the first tab is PLC addresses. For each tag the list shows the HMI tag, the PLC variable, the data block, the reason and the screen, object or alarm where it is used. The reasons are filtered with chips: optimized data block, indirect address, not found in the PLC, no PLC data, invalid address. There is a search box and an option to show only the tags in use.

The note at the top gives two routes for optimized data blocks: reading through OPC UA, or switching the data block to standard access and downloading it to the PLC. With the second, the download resets the values of the data block to their start values.

When the project is written, two more files are written next to the .fvs file:

• Conversion report: a single HTML file. It opens in a browser and can be printed. It contains the counts, the PLC cards, the tags connected over OPC UA and the warnings.
• PLC address issues list: a semicolon-separated CSV that opens in Excel. It is written only if there are tags whose address could not be resolved.

The Open report and Open address list in Excel buttons on the result card open these files. The file names are formed from the project name and the report name in Convert’s interface language.