Insights
Engineering notes for industrial data and control
Control, telemetry and historians — notes from the projects, not from a brochure.
Updated 31 August 2026
OPC-UA and MQTT in South African telemetry projects
When to use OPC-UA, MQTT, or the protocol already on the PLC — and where a gateway with buffering belongs when the link drops.
Updated 31 August 2026
SANS 241 month-end reporting without the spreadsheet
SANS 241 is the month-end compliance pack. When it is still assembled by hand, start with the critical quality tags and one automated report — add a historian only if the SCADA archive cannot hold or query what you need.
Updated 31 August 2026
What drives PI System TCO after the first licence
PI System and AVEVA Historian are different products with different licence shapes. When tag count, client seats or renewal terms outpace what the plant uses, re-run the numbers against your own tag list — including TDengine Historian beside or instead of PI.
Updated 31 August 2026
What held up — PLC, SCADA and telemetry since 2014
Since 2014 we have commissioned PLC, SCADA and telemetry on South African plants. What still works is stable control, telemetry designed for link loss, and reporting operators trust — not a platform swap on day one.
Let’s talk about the problem behind the article
Share the IO list, the alarm export, or the spreadsheet your team still trusts more than SCADA. We will scope the control, telemetry or reporting work.