Wow. Well done – Heads up thinking in automation

Think Again: I’ll bet that sometime this past year, you’ve used a new industrial automation product—sensors, logic, actuators, software, networks, or instrumentation—and thought, “Wow. Well done. This product is amazing.” Think again and take a moment and fill out a nomination form for a Control Engineering Engineers’ Choice Award. Link to some heads up thinking.

By Mark T. Hoske, Editor in Chief October 1, 2008
Link to some great automation advice

Heads up thinking in this issue – scroll down or click here.

I’ll bet that sometime this past year, you’ve used a new industrial automation product—sensors, logic, actuators, software, networks, or instrumentation—and thought, “Wow. Well done. This product is amazing.” Think again and take a moment and fill out a nomination form for a Control Engineering Engineers’ Choice Award. Or, if you think that might take a little more time than you have today, send an email to your vendor with this link, www.controleng.com/awards , saying, “This is good stuff. You should enter it for a Control Engineering Engineers’ Choice Award, because if it were on the ballot, I’d vote for it.” And, who knows. Your supplier may give you the good customer discount for the compliment. Or maybe take you to lunch. (Not that I’d suggest that buying votes was appropriate, mind you.)

Looking for something?

We’ve created an online index showing all 2008 cover images to date on one page, called the Control Engineering North American print edition 2008 index. Our reason for doing this? I’ve had people contact me looking for something, but not recalling enough keywords to make a search engine useful. Seeing all the covers and headlines in one location should help your need for speed.

Go to www.controleng.com and search “ 2008 index .” If it’s useful, bookmark the page or email it to coworkers for reference.

Heads up thinking in this issue

I have some thinking questions about some of this month’s coverage, and I’d like to hear your views:

  • General Motors let us look under its hood at information integration and network connections from manufacturing into other areas (cover story). How similar or different is this to what you’re doing?

  • Are you connecting networks based on industrial Ethernet to legacy networks? Under what circumstances would you consider gigabit Ethernet on the plant floor? Are you still skeptical about Ethernet protocols for control and automation ? See several applications in this issue and more online.

  • Numerical filtering : Will or does this help with your problem control loops?

  • Do you prefer intrinsically safe or explosion-proof designs ? Why?

MHoske@cfemedia.com