IDA group discusses progress.(Interface for Distributed Automation group)(Brief Article)

The founding members of IDA (Jetter, Kuka Roboter, Lenze, Phoenix Contact, and Sick) met at the ISA show in New Orleans and described the progress that they have made since the alliance was announced at Hannover Fair 2000. They have recently selected the American software firm RTI (Real Time Innovations) to supply the base software NDDS (Network Data Delivery Service).

IDA says it will define its own object-based application layer for standard TCP/IP Ethernet, and make the specifications publicly available. The fundamental goal of the group is to construct a "software bus" for real-time communications using Ethernet protocols. The bus will hide the complexity of network communications so that distributed applications can intercommunicate with no network programming, which means device vendors will have the "plug and work" model for building systems they have wanted for a long time. Roland Bent of Phoenix Contact said the IDA group would have its first demonstration at the SPS/IPC trade show in Nurnberg this November.

Schneider Electric announced at the ISA show that it would support the Interface for Distributed Automation group to develop real-time Ethernet for factory automation.

"Schneider shares IDA's strategy to define a new set of services on top of Ethernet and Internet standards to enable distribution of control in PLCs and intelligent devices connected over Ethernet," said Richard Galera, who works with Schneider's "Transparent Factory" automation architecture. "We are participating actively with IDA to define these standards and to deliver interoperability of devices and applications to customers."

Dick Caro, an analyst with ARC Advisory Group, said that he believed "at least one Tier 1 supplier is prepared to fully support and implement IDA for their networked products. Support by a significant Asian supplier would be a significant event, perhaps enough to force the major suppliers to all support IDA, at least as an alternative interface." Mr. taro said that without a "Tier 1" supplier, IDA may be doomed to the same fate as some of the minor fieldbus solutions-just a curiosity. But if at least one Tier 1 supplier joined the effort, the others would have a more difficult decision to make once users begin specifying IDA.