Got another EPIC firmware minor point release and you really should take a look at this one.
3.4.3 contains some important bug fixes that may impact you, so let’s run through them.
First, two general fixes to extend the life of your hardware.
• KB90239 - Frequently writing unchanged values to some OptoMMP areas may cause excessive writes to permanent storage
• KB90395 - Internal values unnecessarily saved to permanent storage
In short, the number of writes to the EPIC flash should be controlled, ie avoid or remove loops in PAC Control that save unchanged data. These two fixes help manage some of this for you under the covers. For example, if you use the command ‘SetPIDmode’ often and the mode has not changed, you could end up writing the whole PID config to flash needlessly. This firmware patch will detect that nothing has changed and simply will not write it.
To help you understand how many writes your strategy is doing, this firmware version adds a new OptoMMP address: 0xFFFF F030 0250. You could add some logic to read this into your strategy and use it alongside your existing diagnostics / system health metrics. Or at the very least keep an eye on that address in groov Manage from time to time.
groov View 4.4b
Bug Fixes - These are pretty important, I have hit a few of them myself on my personal groov View project and some at Opto.
• KB90028 - Video gadgets erroneously indicate that trial period ended before it started
• KB90289 - Some users can’t see video from video gadgets with proxy option
• KB90330 - Page access permissions reset to All Users
• KB90394 - Cannot select an array index on some OPC UA array tags
• KB90399 - OPC UA tags with Number type are selectable in Build mode, but report type error in View mode
Data Service 2.0.4
Bug Fixes - If you are using the data service, you will need to carefully review these fixes.
• KB90382 - Can’t view or write to energy tags
• KB90384 - Some groov EPIC/groov RIO device tags are missing (Device Type, Hardware Make and Software Version)
• KB90386 - Some tag properties for groov EPIC/groov RIO with Sparkplug B payloads are missing/incorrect (Mostly tag metadata, for example engUnit).
• KB90388 - Tag browsers display channel features that are not public, for example channel attributes (on-latch, off-latch, counter, maximum, or minimum) may appear when not ‘make public’ is checked for them.
• KB90390 - MQTT/Data Service may not issue Death Certificate when MQTT service restarted
• KB90400 - 32-bit integers that represent boolean values aren’t presented as booleans
Of course this release also bundles up the 3.4.1 fixes. You may recall I posted that the 3.4.1 release was a little bit optional, but this one is quite a bit more important and you should very carefully consider applying it as a matter of course.
As usual, you can download this update for free from your manage.groov.com portal.