Control Expert IDE

M580 BME P58 5040

Below, there is as example of IO Scanning configured in Unity Pro (Control Expert). Configuration table looks almost the same as in previous examples.

But for Modicon M580 family, the concept of configuration changed. Till now, results of IO Scanning were stored in Located Memory consuming Modbus Addresses (%MW). In M580 controllers, results of IO Scanning are stored in Unlocated Memory within the special structure created based on the user configuration. Each Request Item can be configured separately with variety of basic data type and even arrays.

Although I found this configuration method easier to work with once the structure is ready, creating a structure can be problematic. Till Control Expert v15.3, all the configurations must be done manually. If I need to add 100 devices and configure Request Items with specific tags, I can’t make one and duplicate it 100 times, I need to do it manually. This is nightmare for someone like me to do things manually. There is a high chance of mistake. You could think of creating Your own Derived Data Type and assigning it to the Request Item. But it is also not possible. Right now, the only effective method to save time for manual assignment of all variables is simply to make one big array or words and create a peace of code that assigns data to Your structure or directly to variables utilized in the code.