Yokogawa Electric Corporation has released the FieldMateR2.03 versatile device management tool: an upgraded version intended for use in plants and other production-related sites. In response to rapid growth in the Chinese market, Chinese language support has been included as a standard feature. Support for the ISA100.11a field wireless communications standard is also provided.
Development background
Digital communications standards play an increasingly important role in communications between plant central control systems and field sensors. With conventional field communications, only measured values from sensors are sent to the central control systems. With digital communication technologies, however, additional data such as sensor settings and maintenance information can be sent, while operators in a central control room are also able to configure and adjust the sensors remotely.
Plants using sensors from multiple vendors that rely on more than one communications standard require versatile software tools for device configuration, adjustment, and management. FieldMate, an open standard software package that supports FDT/DTM as well as all other major field communications standards, is ideally suited for such requirements.
Product features
Chinese language support provided as a standard feature: FieldMate now supports the Chinese language, in addition to Japanese and English, positioning this product to capture a larger share of the rapidly growing Chinese market. Yokogawa has plans to add support for other languages at a later date.
Support of the field wireless communications standard: The upgraded version of FieldMate is now capable of supporting the ISA100.11a field wireless communications standard, which is gaining rapid acceptance in the marketplace. FieldMate’s support of all major field communication protocols allows customers to manage a wide variety of devices and to select field sensors from different vendors.
FieldMate is a PC-based device configuration tool with an intuitive, user-friendly interface that is used to perform initial setup, routine maintenance, and device replacement. It supports all major industry-standard communication protocols such as Foundation Fieldbus, Profibus, Brain, and HART, as well as the FDT/DTM open framework for setting and adjusting any vendor’s network-capable field device, regardless of which communications protocol is used. In addition, support for the ISA100.11a field wireless communications standard enables configuration, adjustment, and management of a wider variety of field devices in plants.
Markets and applications
Target markets include facility maintenance divisions in process industries such as oil, petrochemicals, chemicals, pulp and paper, pharmaceuticals, foods and beverages, and iron and steel. Applications include sensor configuration, adjustment, and inspection and device information management in plants and other production facilities.
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