Software Toolbox Technical Blog

Industrial data is most valuable when it can be seen, understood, and acted upon. OPC UA has long been a widely adopted standard for securely exchanging data in industrial automation, but many users still face challenges: quickly visualizing live values without heavy software, sharing those values with non-technical stakeholders, and reducing setup complexity. 

That’s why we’re excited to announce a new feature in DataCaster: direct OPC UA connectivity. So excited that we made a video about it that you can watch further down this blog in which I will show you how easy this new feature is to implement.With this enhancement, DataCaster can now connect to your OPC UA servers, browse and select tags, and stream live data values into simple displays where they matter most: bridging the gap between raw data and real-time decision-making with just a few clicks.

Industrial teams often find that valuable information lives in more than one place. You can make better decisions when you have access to both live and historical data in one place. Real-time values from PLCs and sensors are essential for monitoring, but SQL databases often hold equally important information, like productions records, quality results, or business transactions. Without a way to easily and quickly connect these sources, teams may spend extra time running manual queries or waiting on reports, slowing down decision making.

Why it matters

Without connecting live and historical sources, operators and engineers are forced to piece together information from separate systems, which slows response time and increases the risk of errors. When SQL data like production orders, quality checks, or inventory status is available side-by-side with live sensor and PLC values, teams gain the full context they need to make decisions faster and with greater confidence.

Software Toolbox attends a wide variety of customer and networking events throughout the year. Each one gives us valuable opportunities to connect with our customers, exchange ideas with peers, and gather feedback that helps us improve what we do. Some stand out because of the conversations they spark, the insights they deliver, or the energy they generate within the community. OT SCADA CON was one of those connection sparking events. In this blog, I will share some of the key takeaways I brought home from the experience.

OT SCADA CON: Fast-Paced Learning, Real-World Insights

OT SCADA CON is a unique, community-driven conference organized by the Automation Ladies and their volunteers, bringing together professionals from across the industrial automation space. While the name highlights Operational Technology (OT) and Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA), the event essentially covers everything in the world of SCADA and beyond. Launched just last year, the conference has already doubled in size.  

This post is part of our Summer of IoT blog series, where we spotlight practical tools that solve real-world industrial challenges. In this installment, we dive into how DataCaster helps teams visualize key metrics, quickly, clearly, and without the hassle.

For engineers and operations teams, getting the right data in front of the right people at the right time can make all the difference. But too often, valuable metrics like uptime, downtime, production rates, and OEE stay buried in PLCs, SCADA systems, or databases, while teams rely on outdated methods like whiteboards, spreadsheets, or even handwritten notes.

If you’ve ever said, “I just want to see this data on a screen over there so the team can act on it,” there’s now a straightforward way to do just that, without writing code, managing a PC, or spinning up an IT project.

For OEMs (Original Equipment Manufacturers), delivering high-performance machinery is an absolute requirement. However, their true measurement of success lies with ensuring long-term reliability and maximizing uptime for their customers. Downtime isn’t just an inconvenience – it can result in substantial financial losses, impacting both productivity and profitability. By prioritizing dependability in their chosen solutions, OEMs can strengthen customer trust, enhance operational efficiency, and differentiate themselves in a competitive market.

Welcome back to our Data Storage Deep Dive Series, where we continue to explore innovative ways to integrate our industrial automation software solutions with enterprise-level historians. In one of our previous posts of this series, Software Toolbox Helps You Fly Higher with Canary Historian, we demonstrated how data from diverse sources could be collected using TOP Server, OmniServer and Cogent DataHub, and subsequently funneled into Canary Historian for advanced trend analysis.

Today, we’re shifting our focus to AVEVA PI System (formerly known as OSIsoft PI), a widely used data repository, and how it can be used alongside AVEVA CONNECT to gain even more value from your industrial data. This blog will showcase how you can leverage the Cogent DataHub to seamlessly integrate data into your PI System, and from there, to CONNECT Data Services, unlocking cloud-based capabilities such as visualization and advanced analytics options for your organization.

Building on last week’s Cogent DataHub v11 Security Enhancements Deep Dive blog, this post dives into a practical application of these security enhancement by focusing on the implementation of multifactor authentication (MFA) using a TOTP (Time-based One-time Password) key to secure a Remote Config connection to the DataHub. We will guide you through the process of setting up a built-in user with the “RemoteConfig” role, ensuring that remote access is equipped with the necessary permissions. To further strengthen security, we’ll integrate a TOTP key with an authentication app and define an IP pattern Principal to restrict access to specific source network locations. We’ll conclude by performing a successful login from a different system, thus verifying the effectiveness of our secure setup.

As briefly shared in our blog “Cogent DataHub V11 Features to Be Excited About”, Cogent DataHub has expanded its security configuration and options in the v11 release, offering even greater protection and flexibility of data sharing. In this blog we will explore DataHub V11’s comprehensive framework for managing access through custom configuration of Organizations, Users with multi-Factor authentication (MFA), Active Directory Integration, Security Principals, Roles and Permissions ensuring that only authorized individuals can perform specific actions or access a specific set of data.