PCs And Automation

I was helping an automation engineer confirm that the components he had chosen, were suitable for his project. The reason he needed a second opinion was because the controller for the project was a PC, not the usual PLC to which he was accustomed. The components he had chosen were fine so his experience was enough to carry him through, even though he was outside his comfort zone. I wonder if the PC programmer, who doesn't have any experience controlling hardware, will do nearly as well. Depending on whether I get a call to help out or not, I'll have my answer.

This was a reminder of how uncommon my automation experience is. The majority of the automation projects that I've done, used a PC as the controller. Many people might recognise the small form factor SBCs as a PC, but except for the size, it had exactly the same functionality as a regular PC. These projects all had a significant data processing component, which is the main reason to switch to a PC. However, automation people are endeared their PLCs so the manufacturers have come up with many ways to push the data processing onto a PC via a network. Frankly these solutions start to look just as complex and risky as the PC only system.