Re: New forum topic - Open Control
Feb 14, 2002 1:32 pm, by Greg Goodman
Text :
> With a proprietary system the trouble-shooter knows the fundamental nature
> of the program can not be changed so he is perfectly comfortable standing on
> that knowledge. Not so with an open source system.

Huh? Whether your system is proprietary or open, you change the fundamental nature of a program by installing something else on top of it. With open software, such a change can be accomplished by modifying the code (or obtaining a modified copy of the code), compiling it, and installing it. I know of a number of sites whose control systems are running Linux, and not one of them has the sytsem source code or a development environment available to the operator login.

> One of the posts indicated that Linux is structured and organized by the
> distributor and the core programs are not touched unless absolutely
> necessary. Who makes this decision, The guy on the site?, His supervisor?
> The president of the company 5,000 miles away? How is this software
> structured by the distributor and never touched, so much different from
> proprietary software?

Who makes those decisions for your proprietary system? When somebody goes onsite to trouble-shoot your Windows + Wonderware + RSLogix installation, who decides whether it's okay to upgrade Windows from '98 to 2000? Who decides whether it's okay to overwrite a system DLL with one that's supposedly better? Who decides whether to swap out the SuiteLink Modbus driver for a 3rd-party OPC Modbus driver, or change the database interface from SQL to ODBC, or move the ethernet connection from the local firewall to a DSL modem dialed directly into an ISP?

If modifying the software architecture of the system is something anybody's allowed to do, it doesn't much matter whether it's proprietary
or open. And if there's a process for considering and approving modifications, it doesn't much matter whether the software's proprietary of open.

Greg Goodman
Chiron Consulting
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