Customer Reviews

Creating Human Machine Interfaces using Visual Basic

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

This book is written with the beginner Visual Basic developer in mind. If you are already an experienced VB developer, but know nothing about HMI systems, it is also a useful resource. It is the only book I have run across that addresses developing industrial applications using non-proprietary software. It's a life-saver if you are interested in developing a low-cost, low-maintenance HMI or SCADA application for your factory environment. It provides step-by-step instructions for connecting an HMI front-end to a PLC. If you are new to Visual Basic or interested in learning VB and specifically how it applies to an industrial application, I would highly recommend adding this book to your reference material. If you want to further your education in this area, I would also recommend contacting the author to schedule on-site training.

I found this book too simplistic and way overpriced. It provided little information that could not be found for free on the internet. Furthermore, references are made to specific products, which means that the programs can not be run without downloading (or buying) the demos (some of which are severly limited).
It doesn't even have an index!

I've been working on a lighting control program in visual basic that reads and writes to PLCs, and this book didn't give me any new ideas. It might be useful to someone who wanted to create an HMI interface but knew nothing about Visual Basic (or programming in general), but the project would have to be almost exactly like one of the examples in the book

This book was written for a specific audience. If you are familiar with field devices and are moving into VB and the interface side of things, then this is the book for you. If you already know VB, then you will pick up a few things but not enough to justify the price. All in all, a good book, possibly a great one, depending, of course, on where you are coming from.

Used in conjuction with Jeff's training course adds valuable resources to your information library. The book is packed with examples and live HMI applications. The book also comes with a CD which contains demos of the best HMI support utilities on the market.

This book seems to be designed to sell specific equipment and software. It would cost well over $1,000 to get any benefit from it. I can't afford to waste the kind of money I paid for this book. It should have been more forthcoming in the Amazon intro to the book. Title is very misleading. A severe disappointment.

This books will get you started with ideas on how to write a Human Machine Interface application in VB. Books on this subject are few and far between. The only other book that I have found to be useful is "Automating Science and Engineering Laboratories with Visual Basic" by Russo and Echols. More advanced programmers will be somewhat disappointed that this book doesn't cover more advanced issues with HMI. Another excellent resource is ... where you will find the actual source code to a complete HMI application that you can modify to fit your needs.

Let's start with stating that I create HMI's/SCADA systems for a living. I have used all the major commercial software including Wonderware and iFIX. This book was interesting. But as far as I'm concerned it left out the most important information. The author wants you to use a demo version of the software that 'talks' with the PLC. For me it's the reading and writing to the PLC that is important. It talked about how to animate graphic, etc. But it didn't even cover 'good' practices. There really needs to be a section on serial or TCP/IP communications to really make it worth something long term. The driver you would have to buy to use this more than a fun activity cost about $1000.

This book is very helpul for a beginner that want to explore the world of Automation step by step . I would be helpul have a disk enclosed with some examples and flow charts. Good reference book . I hope to see a new improved edition.

this book is good to implement a project of HMI using a comercial driver, but dont take issues like comunication, desing a good HMI, the PLC Hardware.
This is only an example of use a comercial driver to conect your Visual Basic project to a PLC, only teach how configurate the driver