Saving data to a pc in different format

PAC Project
1

Hi,

I am wondering if ftp is the only way to save data from PAC to the connected pc.?

  1. Is there any other way to save data to a PC connected to same switch or network without FTP? I don’t want to rely on SD card.

  2. How can we save the data in CSV format(presently I am saving in SD card with file extension".txt’? somewhere I found to use PAC display, but its very confusing on how can we export/grab data using PAC display.

2

For a PAC controller, the FTP is the only way.
Since it is on the network and does not have any way to map network drives, using the FTP is the easiest.
Depending on the file size, you don’t need to use the SDcard, the PAC Controller has a nice chunk of memory that you can FTP to and from.
No SDcard needed.

If you are using SoftPAC, then you can read and write to the local PC C: drive.
Since SoftPAC is running on Windows, its local file storage is the C: drive.
That is one of the main reasons why I run a SoftPAC controller on a laptop in my home automation test lab… So I can shift data in and out of Opto via Dropbox.

3

PACBeginner – could you tell us more about what you’re trying to do, generally? PAC Display does have some nice logging features you might be able to use and save yourself some coding, depending on your specific needs.

4

For example, when the data logged by a SuperTrend wasn’t exactly what one user needed, it was pretty easy to transform that log into something more in line with his needs. Check out this post:
http://www.opto22.com/community/showthread.php?t=237&p=702&viewfull=1#post702

5

Thank you very much ben and mstjohn for the reply.

We have SNAP-PAC-R2 , with several different sensors connected, we wanted to reliably get data every time ( it will be running 24 hrs continuously) . Our file size will grow bigger and bigger with increment in time (anywhere near 250Mb+). So I am looking for a way to effectively save or get data from PAC. I wanted SD card as backup and wanted to save data to a PC which can be directly connected to the PAC as I understand now that ftp is the only way.
I do have few more questions:

  1. Currently I save data in a (.txt) file, and data keeps on appending to it with time stamps( in the same file). can I create a directory or different file on SD card for each day or on FTP server on a PC. As in communication handle there is no way to append time stamps to the file, where as if I use script I keep getting error that file handle is open .

I use , open OutgoingCommunication(handle), SetCommunicationHandleValue and CloseCommunication(handle) in script, and define communication handle as “initialize on strategy run”.

2.Will saving data in binary can reduce the file size? how can I save it in binary? will adding .bin extension works?

6
  1. As long as the data is separated by spaces or commas you can just change the extension to .csv
    to be sure you could use Microsoft excel to import the data from the text fil then save as .csv this is a nice way to do it because it will show you how it is going to calumniate the data.