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OPC UA Client Driver

The document provides an overview of the iFIX OPC UA Client Driver, detailing its features, configuration, and security considerations. It outlines how to connect to OPC UA Servers, manage user privileges, and configure the driver using the Configuration Hub tool. Additionally, it highlights limitations of the driver and the importance of security in its operation.

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Thiago Borba
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© © All Rights Reserved
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0% found this document useful (0 votes)
10 views

OPC UA Client Driver

The document provides an overview of the iFIX OPC UA Client Driver, detailing its features, configuration, and security considerations. It outlines how to connect to OPC UA Servers, manage user privileges, and configure the driver using the Configuration Hub tool. Additionally, it highlights limitations of the driver and the importance of security in its operation.

Uploaded by

Thiago Borba
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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PROFICY® SOFTWARE & SERVICES

iFIX
OPC UA Client Driver
Proprietary Notice
The information contained in this publication is believed to be accurate and reliable.
However, GE Vernova assumes no responsibilities for any errors, omissions or
inaccuracies. Information contained in the publication is subject to change without notice.

No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form, or stored in a database or


retrieval system, or transmitted or distributed in any form by any means, electronic,
mechanical photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of
GE Vernova. Information contained herein is subject to change without notice.

© 2024 GE Vernova and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved.

Trademark Notices
“VERNOVA” is a registered trademark of GE Vernova. “GE VERNOVA” is a registered
trademark of GE Aerospace exclusively licensed to GE Vernova. The terms “GE” and the
GE Monogram are trademarks of GE Aerospace, and are used with permission. All other
trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

Microsoft® is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation, in the United States and/or


other countries.

All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

We want to hear from you. If you have any comments, questions, or suggestions about our
documentation, send them to the following email address:
[email protected]
Table of Contents

OPC UA Client Driver 1

Introduction 1

Overview of the OPC UA Client Driver 1

How the OPC UA Driver Works 1

Features of the OPC UA Client Driver 2

Limitations 3

Security 3

Security Considerations 4

Configuration 4

Quick Start: OPC UA Client Configuration 4

How to Add User Privileges for the OPC UA Client Driver in iFIX 5

How to Enable Security in iFIX 5

How to Add the OPC UA Driver in iFIX 5

How to Start the Configuration Hub tool 6

How to Add a Server in the Configuration Hub tool 6

How to Trust Certificates for the OPC UA Client 7

Server Configuration 8

Prerequisites to Add a Server in the Configuration Hub Tool 9

Add a Server in Configuration Hub 9

Manage Certificate Trust Lists 10

Group Configuration 11

Add a New Group 12

Delete a Group 12

Redundancy Configuration 12

Configure Redundancy 13

Special Considerations for Enhanced Failover 13

Deleting Servers or Groups 14

Notes on Certificate Management 14

Special I/O Addresses 14

© 2024 General Electric Company. All rights reserved. i


Index 15

ii © 2024 General Electric Company. All rights reserved.


OPC UA Client Driver

The iFIX OPC UA (OPC Unified Architecture) Client is a device communications module that can con-
nect to OPC UA Servers and collect data from UA variables. This help provides information on how to
configure and use this client.

The OPC UA Client Driver help contains the following sections:

l Introduction
l Security
l Configuration

Introduction

For a brief introduction on the iFIX OPC UA Client, refer to the sections below.

l "Overview of the OPC UA Client Driver" below


l "How the OPC UA Driver Works" below
l "Features of the OPC UA Client Driver" on the next page
l "Limitations" on page 3

Overview of the OPC UA Client Driver

OPC UA defines a platform independent communication system that has a useful and adaptive Information
Model for both industrial and business application needs. Like iFIX, OPC UA builds on the success and
strength of common industrial standards. Developed by the OPC Foundation and meant to be platform inde-
pendent, OPC UA can provide lower costs and increased productivity for end-users, systems integrators,
and process control vendors alike by focusing communications issues on a single technology and strategy.

The iFIX OPC UA (OPC Unified Architecture) Client is a device communications module that can connect
to OPC UA Servers to browse and collect data from items in the OPC UA address space. Use the Con-
figuration Hub tool to browse an OPC UA Server and automatically create driver tags in iFIX.

The OPC UA Client can be configured in a few simple steps. For details on these steps, refer to the "Quick
Start: OPC UA Client Configuration" on page 4 topic.

How the OPC UA Driver Works

Basic components for iFIX OPC UA Client communication and the general connectivity hierarchy is out-
lined in the following figure.

© 2024 General Electric Company. All rights reserved. 1


Features of the OPC UA Client Driver

The OPC UA Client Driver provides the following features:

2 © 2024 General Electric Company. All rights reserved.


l Web configuration provided using Configuration Hub.
l Support for the main OPC Unified Architecture (UA) information model for Data Access (DA).
l An OPC UA implementation that allows for secure and reliable communication and authen-
tication of clients, servers, and users.
l Use of Windows Authentication for standard security protocols.
l Support for connections to the iFIX OPC UA Server or other OPC UA Servers.
l Ability to auto create iFIX tags in bulk from the Database Manager import, for node IDs no longer
than 80 characters (in the I/O address field in the database) and primary blocks.
l Provides similar interactions to iFIX as other I/O drivers. The OPC UA Client Driver is loaded,
configured, and accessed in the same or similar manner to existing I/O drivers.
l Support for OPC UA Client redundancy.

Limitations

When using the OPC UA Client (OUA) Driver with iFIX, be aware of the following limitations:

l While the OPC Driver supports Suppression of COMM alarms and Data Latching, the
OPC UA Client driver does not.
l Array indexes greater than 65535 are not supported.
l Autocreating a driver tag in the Database Manager with an index into an array is not supported.
l Matrices are not supported. While OPC UA supports scalar values, arrays, and matrices,
Matrices are not supported in the OPC UA Client Driver.
l Writing values greater than 256 bytes is not supported. This could be as few as 128 characters.
l The OPC UA Client Driver has been tested with up to 50 configured servers, and 250 groups. Per-
formance or connectivity issues may be encountered when exceeding those limits.
l The OPC UA Client Driver can only write to individual elements (1 array index at a time). You can-
not write to the whole array at the same time. Servers that do not support writing to individual
array elements will reject the individual index write and may return an error such as
BadWriteNotSupported.
l Servers that do not support subscriptions are unsupported. We require the server to support sub-
scriptions.
l Autocreate of tags in the Database Manager only works for node IDs no longer than 80 char-
acters (the I/O address field in database).
l Complex data types are not supported. Arrays of complex data types will report BadOutOfRange
errors in the iFixUaClient_OUASPOLL.log file. Examples of complex types include:
l DataValue
l DiagnosticInfo
l Enumeration
l Structure
l XmlElement (can read a single element as a string, but arrays are unreadable)

Security

Security is based on OPC UA standards. The OPC UA Client Driver uses the Configuration Hub tool for
configuration. From this powerful web client you can configure a connection to an OPC UA Server,
browse for data sources, and automatically populate the iFIX database with new tags.

Use of the Configuration Hub tool will require you to enable security in iFIX.

© 2024 General Electric Company. All rights reserved. 3


For more information on security, refer to the Security Considerations section.

Security Considerations

Be aware of the following when using the OPC UA Client Driver:

l Configuration Hub is provided for driver configuration. This tool integrates with the iFIX security
for user authentication and authorization.
l The user must provide a valid iFIX user name and password in order to successfully connect to
iFIX from Configuration Hub.
l In order to login to Configuration Hub, the iFIX user must belong to the Application Designer
security group in iFIX.
l After a session has been established with the OPC UA Server, the user’s permissions and priv-
ileges are enforced by the iFIX security system. If the logged-in user does not have permission to
write to a given tag or acknowledge its alarms (based on the tag’s security areas configuration),
then the operation will fail.
l When using Enhanced Failover, the OPC UA Client will not allow you to make changes unless
the primary node is in Maintenance Mode.

Configuration

Configuration for the OPC UA Client Driver includes the following:

l Quick Start: OPC UA Client Configuration


l Server Configuration
l Group Configuration
l Redundancy Configuration

Quick Start: OPC UA Client Configuration

The OPC UA Client Driver is added to iFIX the same way you would add other drivers, using the System
Configuration (SCU) tool. After you add the driver and restart iFIX, you can then configure the driver
using Configuration Hub. The following steps outline how to quickly add and configure your driver.

1. In iFIX, add user privileges (add user to Application Designer group) and enable security.
2. In the iFIX System Configuration Utility, add the OPC UA Client driver, if it is not already added.
3. Start or restart iFIX.
4. Start Configuration Hub from the iFIX WorkSpace (in the system tree, select the OUA entry in
the I/O Drivers folder). Use the iFIX user name and password that you created in the previous
steps to log in.
5. Confirm that your OPC UA Server is up and running.
6. In the Configuration Hub tool, click Connections, and on the OPC UA tab, click the New button to
add a server. In the Details panel, specify user credentials, and a security policy.
7. On the Connection tab, click Test Connection to begin the certificate trust process:
a. On the iFIX SCADA for Configuration Hub, trust the server..
b. On the OPC UA Server, in its certificate management tool, trust the OPC UA Client.
c. In the Configuration Hub tool, click Test Connection again. The connection should suc-
ceed.

4 © 2024 General Electric Company. All rights reserved.


8. Proceed to create your Groups.
IMPORTANT: Every time you make a change in the configuration from Configuration Hub, the data is
reloaded in the configuration and the driver is restarted. This is important to know if you are making changes
on a live system. You will not need to restart iFIX after you make any changes in Configuration Hub.

How to Add User Privileges for the OPC UA Client Driver in iFIX
1. Start iFIX.
2. In the WorkSpace, on the Applications tab, click Security and then Security Configuration Utility.
3. On the Edit menu select User Accounts. The User Accounts dialog box appears.
4. Click Add. The User Profile dialog box appears.
5. If using Windows users, select Use Windows Security.
6. In the User Name field, enter the user that you created for use with iFIX.
7. If needed, enter the Domain.
8. Add the Application Designer group to the user in order to use Configuration Hub.
9. Modify other groups, security areas, and application features as appropriate. Do not delete Database
Save and Database Block Add-Delete application features as those are needed to add tags.
10. Click OK, and OK again.
11. On the File menu, click Save.

How to Enable Security in iFIX


1. From the Security Configuration Utility, on the Edit menu, select Configuration. The Configuration
dialog box appears.
2. Under User-based Security, select Enabled.
3. On the File menu, click Save. You will now be requested to enter the user name and password to
login.
4. Enter the user name and password for your user.

How to Add the OPC UA Driver in iFIX


NOTE: In iFIX 6.5 and greater, this driver is added by default. Follow these steps if you lost the defaults and need
to add it again.

1. Shut down iFIX, and confirm that iFIX is not running.


2. On the Start menu, go to iFIX, and then click System Configuration.
3. On the Configure menu, select SCADA Configuration.
4. In the I/O Driver Name field, click the browse button to open the available driver list.
5. Select OUA - OPC Client and click OK.
6. Click Add to move the driver into the Configured Drivers list, as shown in the following figure.

© 2024 General Electric Company. All rights reserved. 5


7. Save the configuration, and close the System Configuration utility.
8. Start or restart iFIX. Login with the user name and password configured to use the Configuration Hub
tool, and then open the WorkSpace.

How to Start the Configuration Hub tool


1. From the iFIX WorkSpace, in the System tree, open the I/O Drivers folder.
2. Double-click the OUA entry to open Configuration Hub.

The server selection screen for Configuration Hub appears in a web browser.

3. Select the iFIX Server you want to connect to. The login screen appears for that selected server.
4. Enter the user name and password of the account configured to use the Configuration Hub tool.
NOTE: Configuration Hub is currently not supported in Internet Explorer.

How to Add a Server in the Configuration Hub tool


The following steps describe how to add a server in the Configuration Hub tool.

1. On the computer where your OPC UA Server resides, confirm that your server is up and running.
This step is important to ensure that you can retrieve the policies when configuring your server. You
must do this before making any configuration additions or changes in the Configuration Hub tool.

2. From the Configuration Hub tool, on the Connection tab, click OPC UA, and then click the New but-
ton to add a server. The New OPC UA Server Connection dialog box appears.

6 © 2024 General Electric Company. All rights reserved.


3. In the Server Name field, enter the logical name of the computer where the OPC UA Server is run-
ning (include the fully qualified domain name if on a domain).

4. In the Endpoint URL field, enter the host name or IP address and port used to connect with the
OPC UA Server. For example: opc.tcp://MyServer:51400/. The format of this URL (with the machine
name, IP address, or fully qualified domain name) is defined on your OPC UA Server.

5. On the Details panel, select the Security Mode (None, Sign, or Sign and Encrypt).

6. In the Security Policy Uri field, select a security policy to apply to this connection: Basic128Rsa15,
Basic256, Basic256Sha256, Aes128_Sha256_RsaOaep, or Aes256_Sha256_RsaPss.
NOTE: If you are not sure what to select for Security Mode and Security Policy or simply want to test a con-
nection, select None. Be sure that you go back and change this setting later, however, to ensure you have
adequate security enabled for your connections.

7. Also on the Details panel, confirm that Disable is set to False so that you can use this driver to cre-
ate groups and tags for iFIX. When the Disabled field is set to True, the configuration exists, but it is
not available for use yet.

8. Select an authentication type: Anonymous or UserName/Password. It is recommended that you


select UserName/Password to provide the highest level of encryption. Anonymous does not provide
any protection for accessing data or logging.

9. If UserName/Password is selected, enter the user name and password to connect to the OPC UA
Server.

10. Click Test Connection near the top of the Details panel to test the server configuration.

11. Click Save.

How to Trust Certificates for the OPC UA Client


The following steps describe how to configure the certificate for the server after you add it. A certificate
must be configured before any connection with the server can be established. These steps are mandatory
before you can use the driver in iFIX run mode.
IMPORTANT: iFIX must be running with security enabled in order to perform these steps. The OPC UA Server
also must be running.

1. From Configuration Hub, select the configured server on the Connection tab. (The server name, end-
point URL, security mode, security policy, and authentication settings should already be configured.)
2. Click Test Connection. Based on the server security policies, the connection will fail with a ‘Server
Not trusted’ message.
3. On the SCADA Server, trust the OPC UA Server's certificate:
a. From the iFIX WorkSpace, on the Application tab, click OPC UA Configuration. The
OPC UA Server Configuration Tool appears.
b. Click the Trust List.
c. Select the server name and click Trust. A message appears.
d. Click Yes to continue.
4. Click Test Connection again. The test will fail again, this time with a ‘Server doesn’t trust this client’
message.

© 2024 General Electric Company. All rights reserved. 7


5. On the OPC UA Server, use the OPC UA Server's certificate management tool to trust the
iFIX OPC UA Client Driver certificate.
6. Go back to the Configuration Hub tool, with the same server selected, click Test Connection again.
The connection should now succeed.
7. You can now proceed to create Groups.

Server Configuration

Use the Connection screen in the Configuration Hub tool to add your OPC UA server, and configure your
connection to the OPC UA Server, as shown in the following figure. From the Details panel, you can spe-
cify the OPC UA Server name, endpoint URL, security mode (signing options), security policy (encryp-
tion type), and authentication settings (anonymous or a specified user). Typically, the OPC UA Server is
remote to the iFIX SCADA install.

After you add the connection, you must trust the server and client certificates before you can establish a
connection with the server. A server must be enabled before you can add groups or driver tags.

The following text explains how to add a server and make a connection to it, so that you can sub-
sequently add groups and tags.
IMPORTANT: After you have successfully connected to an OPC UA Server and created Driver Tags, you
should not change the configured Endpoint URL of the server unless the server instance has been moved or
its endpoint has changed (such as if it now uses a different port). Changing the Endpoint URL to point to a dif-
ferent server can result in no data being available for some or all Driver Tags from that server. It is recom-
mended to always create new server connections if connecting to a different server.

Additionally, on the Connection tab, you can also specify the redundancy settings for your
OPC UA Server connection, if you have this feature enabled on your OPC UA Server. On the Details
panel, scroll to the end of the details to view the Redundancy settings, as show in the following figure.
You can configure up to 3 backup servers (endpoint URLs).

8 © 2024 General Electric Company. All rights reserved.


Prerequisites to Add a Server in the Configuration Hub Tool
Before you can add a server on the Connection tab you must:

l Confirm that you have a license to use the OUA Driver.


l Create a user for Configuration Hub.
l In iFIX, add that user to the Application Designer group.
l Enable security in FIX.
l Switch the primary SCADA into maintenance mode, if using Enhanced Failover. You cannot use
the Configuration Hub tool without doing so.
l In the iFIX System Configuration Utility (SCU), add the OPC UA Client Driver (OUA -
OPC Client) to the I/O driver list (by default, on new installs this driver is added), and restart
iFIX after you add it.

For details on these steps, refer to the "Quick Start: OPC UA Client Configuration" on page 4 topic.

Add a Server in Configuration Hub


The following steps describe how to add a server in Configuration Hub.

1. On the computer where your OPC UA Server resides, confirm that your server is up and running.
This step is important to ensure that you can retrieve the policies when configuring your server.
You must do this before making any configuration additions or changes in the Configuration Hub

© 2024 General Electric Company. All rights reserved. 9


tool.

2. From the Configuration Hub tool, on the Connection tab, click OPC UA, and then click the New
button to add a server. The New OPC UA Server Connection dialog box appears.

3. In the Server Name field, enter the logical name of the computer where the OPC UA Server is run-
ning (include the fully qualified domain name if on a domain).

4. In the Endpoint URL field, enter the host name or IP address and port used to connect with the
OPC UA Server. For example: opc.tcp://MyServer:51400/. The format of this URL (with the
machine name, IP address, or fully qualified domain name) is defined on your OPC UA Server.

5. On the Details panel, select the Security Mode (None, Sign, or Sign and Encrypt).

6. In the Security Policy Uri field, select a security policy to apply to this connection:
Basic128Rsa15, Basic256, Basic256Sha256, Aes128_Sha256_RsaOaep, or Aes256_Sha256_
RsaPss.
NOTE: If you are not sure what to select for Security Mode and Security Policy or simply want to test a
connection, select None. Be sure that you go back and change this setting later, however, to ensure
you have adequate security enabled for your connections.

7. Also on the Details panel, confirm that Disable is set to False so that you can use this driver to
create groups and tags for iFIX. When the Disabled field is set to True, the configuration exists,
but it is not available for use yet.

8. Select an authentication type: Anonymous or UserName/Password. It is recommended that you


select UserName/Password to provide the highest level of encryption. Anonymous does not
provide any protection for accessing data or logging.

9. If UserName/Password is selected, enter the user name and password to connect to the
OPC UA Server.

10. Click Test Connection near the top of the Details panel to test the server configuration.

11. Click Save.

Manage Certificate Trust Lists


The following steps describe how to configure the certificate for the server after you add it. A certificate
must be configured before any connection with the server can be established. These steps are man-
datory before you can use the driver in iFIX run mode.
IMPORTANT: iFIX must be running with security enabled in order to perform these steps. The OPC UA Server
also must be running.

1. From the Configuration Hub tool, select the configured server on the Connection tab. (The server
name, endpoint URL, security mode, security policy, and authentication settings should already
be configured.)
2. Click Test Connection. Based on the server security policies, the connection will fail with a
‘Server Not trusted’ message.

10 © 2024 General Electric Company. All rights reserved.


3. On the SCADA Server, trust the OPC UA Server's certificate:
a. From the iFIX WorkSpace, on the Application tab, click OPC UA Configuration. The
OPC UA Server Configuration Tool appears.
b. Click the Trust List.
c. Select the server name and click Trust. A message appears.
d. Click Yes to continue.
4. Click Test Connection again. The test will fail again, this time with a ‘Server doesn’t trust this cli-
ent’ message.
5. On the OPC UA Server, use the OPC UA Server's certificate management tool to trust the
iFIX OPC UA Client Driver certificate.
6. Go back to the Configuration Hub tool, with the same server selected, click Test Connection
again. The connection should now succeed.
7. You can now proceed to create Groups.

Group Configuration

The Connections tab allows you to create, manage, and view groups added or associated with your
OPC UA Server. In the New OPC UA Group Creation dialog box or in the Details panel for the specified
group, you can configure the publishing interval and sampling interval for each group. Any application
requesting data from the OPC UA Server uses group names to access items in the group. Group names
can be up to 19 alphanumeric characters including underscores ( _ ) and hyphens ( - ).

You must have an enabled OPC UA Server configured and a connection established before you add a
group.

© 2024 General Electric Company. All rights reserved. 11


Add a New Group
1. On the Connections tab, select OPC UA, and the click on the server.
2. Next to the server name click the ellipses (...) button and select Create Group. The New
OPC UA Group Creation dialog box appears.
3. Enter the group name. Group names can be up to 19 alphanumeric characters including under-
scores ( _ ) and hyphens ( - ).
4. Enter a Publishing Interval for the OPC UA subscription in milliseconds.
5. Enter a Sampling Interval to sample data sources in the OPC UA Server for changes, in mil-
liseconds.
6. Click Create.
7. Click Save.

Delete a Group
1. Select the row of the group name you want to delete.
2. Click the ellipses (...) button next to group name you want to delete.
3. Click Delete.
4. Click Save to complete the deletion and update the server.

Redundancy Configuration

On the Connection tab, you can also specify the redundancy settings for your OPC UA Server con-
nection, if you have this feature enabled on your OPC UA Server. Scroll to view the Redundancy set-
tings on the Connection tab, as show in the following figure. You can configure Cold, Warm, or Hot
redundancy.

According to the OPC Foundation: Cold redundancy requires an OPC UA Client to reconnect to a
backup server after the initial server has failed. Warm redundancy allows a client to connect to multiple
servers, but only one server will be providing data values. In Hot redundancy, In Hot redundancy, sub-
scriptions are created in multiple servers but only 1 server is active and providing data to the client at a
time.

You can configure up to 3 backup servers (endpoint URLs).

12 © 2024 General Electric Company. All rights reserved.


Configure Redundancy
1. From the Configuration Hub tool, on the Connection tab, select OPC UA, select the server, and
then scroll down to the Redundancy section.
2. In the Mode drop-down lost, select the mode that you want to use for failover (when the active
server becomes unavailable) in the OPC UA Client: Cold, Warm, or Hot. The mode defines how
to perform the switch to a backup server if a failure is detected. If you are not sure what to select
here, select Cold.
3. Enter the endpoint for each backup server you want to enable. You can enter up to three endpoint
URLs below. The format is: opc.tcp://HostName:port/.
4. Click Save.

Special Considerations for Enhanced Failover

If using Enhanced Failover, you must be in Maintenance Mode before you log in the Configuration Hub
UI. Maintenance Mode allows you to temporarily suspend synchronization between the two SCADA
nodes in an Enhanced Failover pair. This allows you to add or modify groups and tags in your iFIX

© 2024 General Electric Company. All rights reserved. 13


database while the Scan, Alarm, and Control (SAC) program is running. When you enter Maintenance
Mode, SCADA synchronization temporarily stops; synchronization between the SCADA pair is sus-
pended. After Maintenance Mode is enabled, you can make changes to the database on the primary
node.

Configuration Hub will not allow you to make changes unless the primary node is in Maintenance Mode.
It will also not allow any configuration on the Secondary node (you cannot login). All changes to a Fail-
over pair’s configuration must be made on the Primary node.
NOTE: If you are manually copying configuration files into the PDB\iFixUaClient subfolders on your Primary
SCADA, you must do the same on your Secondary SCADA.

IMPORTANT: Be aware that if you add a server to the primary, you will need to deal with certificate man-
agement on the secondary as well.

Deleting Servers or Groups


Be aware that when the iFIX SCADA Enhanced Failover pair has the OPC UA Driver configured, any
server or group delete operation in Configuration Hub on the Primary will not be deleted on Secondary
after the maintenance mode synchronization happens. The Secondary SCADA continues to retrieve
data since the server and/or group still exist on the Secondary. As a workaround, manually delete the
server and group files from the secondary SCADA, since you cannot run Configuration Hub on the sec-
ondary SCADA.

Server and Group configuration files are found in the PDB\iFixUaClient folder, in Servers and Groups
folders, respectively. Each server and group has its own file. In each of these folders, compare the con-
tents on the Primary node to those on the Secondary. If a file exists on the Secondary but not on the
Primary then open the file in a text editor and verify that it is a server or group that was deleted from the
Primary. If so, delete that file from the Secondary. Do not delete the Group file for the group named
OUA_DIAGNOSTICS. This is an internal group used by the OPC UA Client Driver. The file may be
named differently on the Secondary than it is on the Primary node, but that is expected, and it should not
be deleted.

For all other operations, the synchronization works as expected such as: Server Create, Driver tag dele-
tions or updates, Group updates, and so on.

Notes on Certificate Management


When the iFIX SCADA is part of an Enhanced Failover pair and we have enabled the OPC UA Driver on
the SCADA, each physical SCADA needs to establish trust with the configured OPC UA servers sep-
arately. After both SCADAs can communicate to a remote OPC UA Server individually using their cer-
tificates, you can then bring the iFIX SCADAs up as failover pair. Be sure to confirm that you can
communicate individually first.

Special I/O Addresses


There are special I/O addresses in iFIX that are very helpful in a Redundancy Configuration for the
OPC UA Client. Using the ConnectionStatus and EndpointUrl addresses, you can see the overall con-
nected status of a (logical) server, and the endpoint it is currently using for data. For more information on
how these work, refer to the Diagnostics topic.

14 © 2024 General Electric Company. All rights reserved.


Index

Enhanced Failover 13

Features of the OPC UA Client Driver 2

Group Configuration 11

Limitations 3

OPC UA Driver 1

Overview of the OPC UA Client Driver 1

Quick Start 4

Redundancy 12

Server Configuration 8

© 2024 General Electric Company. All rights reserved. 15

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