Blog
Guides and articles on plant data.
How industrial data moves from the controller to the systems that use it: namespaces, protocols, edge buffering, rules and the measurements built on them. Written for the engineers who have to make it work.
- Guides
- 3 long, practical guides
- Articles
- 21 articles on industrial data
- Latest
- October 21, 2026
- Talk to the author
- An engineer replies within one working day
Guides
Long reads you can work from.
October 16, 2026 · 12 min read
The edge historian: buffering, store-and-forward and backfill
Where plant history should live, how to size and run an edge buffer, what really happens on replay, and how to backfill gaps from loggers and controllers.
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October 16, 2026 · 14 min read
From OPC UA to MQTT: moving plant data without losing context
Bridging OPC UA servers into MQTT: what context OPC UA carries, how to map it to topics and payloads, and where timestamps and quality go wrong.
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October 16, 2026 · 14 min read
Unified Namespace architecture: a practical guide
How to design, name, secure and roll out a Unified Namespace people still trust a year later: topic rules, payload contracts, state, ownership, tests.
Read the guideArticles
Articles by topic.
Unified Namespace
What a Unified Namespace is, how to name and govern it, and how to roll it out line by line.
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SCADA and Unified Namespace (UNS): Architectural Roles in Modern IIoT
Technical comparison of SCADA-centric and Unified Namespace architectures for modern industrial data distribution.
January 6, 2026 · 6 min read
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UNS rollout roadmap: five phases from pilot line to plant
How to roll out a Unified Namespace architecture in five phases: set up the hub, pilot one line, move existing consumers over, add history, then commands.
November 18, 2025 · 6 min read
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What is a Unified Namespace (UNS)?
What a Unified Namespace is, why plants adopt one, how MQTT and an ISA-95 hierarchy structure it, and what it takes to run one in production.
October 28, 2025 · 8 min read
Connectivity and protocols
OPC UA, MQTT and the controller protocols, and how to move their data across the IT/OT boundary with its context.
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Moving off Kepware, one line at a time
What the Proxus Kepware importer converts, how to run Proxus and Kepware side by side over OPC UA, and what to check before you move a line.
October 21, 2026 · 7 min read
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IT/OT Convergence: Building a Secure Industrial Bridge
Design the IT/OT boundary: replace point-to-point links with a Unified Namespace, keep connections outbound-only, segment networks, control writeback.
January 27, 2026 · 5 min read
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MQTT vs. OPC UA in Modern IIoT: Which Protocol Should You Choose?
MQTT vs OPC UA side by side: architecture, data model, scaling and security, which protocol fits where, and how to bridge OPC UA to MQTT with Sparkplug B.
January 13, 2026 · 8 min read
Edge, rules and historian
What runs on the gateway: buffering through outages, filtering, rules and the history the plant keeps.
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Using the Actor Model for High-Rate Industrial Event Processing in IIoT
How the actor model keeps per-device state and rules in memory at high event rates, why a relational database becomes the bottleneck, and the trade-offs.
February 17, 2026 · 7 min read
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What is Smart Filtering in Edge Computing?
Smart filtering at the industrial edge: how deadbands, aggregation, and event selection control data volume without hiding operational evidence.
December 30, 2025 · 5 min read
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What is Store and Forward in IIoT?
Store and forward in IIoT: how edge buffering reduces data-gap risk, which limits apply, and how recovery depends on capacity and acknowledgements.
December 23, 2025 · 6 min read
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Designing a Rule Engine for Industrial Automation
Industrial rule engines from simple alerts to multi-device workflows, and how Proxus runs visual rules and C# functions at high volume.
November 11, 2025 · 9 min read
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Edge Computing Patterns for High-Performance IIoT
Five edge patterns for IIoT: buffering, local decisions, fan-out, caching and circuit breakers. Cost and latency depend on workload, sampling and network.
November 4, 2025 · 7 min read
OEE, maintenance and energy
The measurements built on plant data: OEE, downtime cost, condition monitoring and energy reporting.
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Practical Guide to CBAM Compliance for Global Manufacturers
What CBAM asks of manufacturers exporting to the EU: direct and indirect embedded emissions, why spreadsheets are risky, and audit-ready metered data.
February 10, 2026 · 6 min read
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How to Estimate Machine Downtime Cost (And Reduce It)
Estimate machine downtime cost with the true downtime cost (TDC) formula and a worked example, separate direct from indirect losses, and prevent stops.
February 3, 2026 · 7 min read
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ISO 50001 Energy Management: Implementation, Monitoring & Compliance
Implement ISO 50001 energy management step by step: build a defensible baseline, choose EnPIs, rank significant energy uses, monitor meters in real time.
December 2, 2025 · 9 min read
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Engineering Guide to Real-Time OEE Implementation
Calculate OEE (availability × performance × quality) from PLC signals in real time: map the six big losses, catch micro-stops and compute at the edge.
November 25, 2025 · 10 min read
AI, MCP and DataOps
Giving assistants and data teams governed access to plant data: MCP, the AI Assistant and the DataOps work underneath.
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The AI Assistant in Proxus: answers from the plant, changes you approve
What Proxus AI Assistant reads, which roles may use it, how its changes wait for approval and land in the audit trail, and what reaches the AI service.
October 21, 2026 · 7 min read
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What is OT DataOps? Bringing Data Engineering to the Factory Floor
OT DataOps explained: the four stages that turn raw OT data into governed, contextualized data for analytics, workflows and AI, and the outcomes to check.
February 24, 2026 · 5 min read
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What is Model Context Protocol (MCP) in Manufacturing?
How Model Context Protocol exposes governed industrial data tools to AI clients while keeping identity, authorization, audit and control-system boundaries.
January 20, 2026 · 7 min read
IIoT fundamentals
Where to start: what IIoT and an industrial data platform are, and how to judge one for your plant.
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Getting Started with IIoT: From SCADA to Real-Time Event Architecture
A practical IIoT introduction: where SCADA-centric data hits its limits, the three-layer edge-to-cloud architecture, core concepts and choosing the stack.
February 25, 2026 · 9 min read
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What is an IIoT Platform? The 5 Core Pillars Explained
What an IIoT platform does, how it differs from an industrial data platform, and which edge, governance, storage, and integration capabilities to evaluate.
December 16, 2025 · 5 min read
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What is IIoT (Industrial Internet of Things)?
How the Industrial Internet of Things differs from consumer IoT in reliability, lifespan, latency and protocols, and why Industry 4.0 depends on it.
December 9, 2025 · 6 min read
Next step
Point it at one of your lines.
The fastest way to judge a data layer is to watch it read your own equipment. Bring one machine and one destination system, and we will build the path in front of you.
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Scoping call
Equipment, protocols, sites and the systems the data has to reach.
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Technical walkthrough
A working demo against a scenario that resembles your plant, not a generic tour.
- 03
Pilot plan
A defined first line or site, with the deployment and security questions answered up front.
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Roll-out
The same templates bring the next lines and sites online.