Shawn Tierney (Host): Hey everybody. It’s Sean Tierney here from Insights and Automation. And I’m trying something completely new. I hope it’s working. I hope you can hear me. I’m actually in a different room here. What I’m calling studio C, which as I’m updating all my PLC courses, I need to I needed another spot to be able to, um, film videos.

And so I’m kind of looking off to the side because I need to get another monitor in here. But in any case, I hope you’re doing well. I don’t know if you guys are seeing my audio. I don’t know if you’re hearing my audio or seeing my video. I don’t know what the quality is, but hey, you get to try things out. I’m actually trying Restream instead of StreamYard because there’s some audio delays with the StreamYard that, uh, if you’re not using the webcams, audio or whatever.

So in any case, I just figured I’d just, uh, show you, uh, you know, test this out. And I wanted to talk to you about discrete versus digital. I o so I’ve seen some people who call themselves experts. Of course, you guys know I train for a living. I teach, uh, you know, Allen-bradley, Siemens PLC, HMI and SCADA and, uh, you know, there’s a lot of competition out there, a lot of people saying they’re experts and a lot of them actually share incorrect information.

And one of the not so, not so horrible information is shares when they’re calling Rockwell’s IO discrete IO. And of course, if you want to use the word discrete, fine. Right. I always use the word digital. And I’ll show you why I use that word. And I know even in Rockwell, there was controversy years ago, I remember seeing a, uh, a letter come out from Rockwell. I don’t know if it was rescinded or not, saying we’re going to go from one to the other or whatever, but in any case, it kind of came to mind. Uh, I was reminded of this. Let me go to my my screen here, but I recently, uh, partnered with Schneider Electric, uh, great company to cover their modicon edge. Io wants a new a whole bunch of io they came out with, and I think it’s really cool. I filmed, I think, a forty five or fifty minute, uh, episode on it. They’re reviewing it now Ensure there’s no additional graphics they want to add or anything I technically got wrong. That’s one of the things we do with our sponsors, is they can go through and say, did you cut this? Add this. You know, just just we want to make sure it’s technically correct. They don’t they don’t get the storyboard, a script, the the episode.

But in any case, it was a lot of fun doing that episode. It’s again, it’s not ready to go out yet, but soon. Uh, in any case, um, I noticed I kept saying digital I o and their modules specifically say on them discrete I o. And so, um, I just noticed that the restream is putting their logo right over my face. Isn’t that nice? So let me take care. See, this is what we call about testing things. You get to test things out. And I have a very easy fix for that. No, that’s not what I wanted to do. Thank you. All right, we’ll put that over there. Okay. That solves that problem.

So in any case, um, you know, and I so I’m recording the video. I keep saying digital I o and then I’m opening the boxes and they see discrete and I’m like, oh that’s, that’s very interesting. It’s a different um, they use a different name for that. And I’m like, you know, I’m curious, you know, I’m saying digital I o because it’s a Rockwell thing, right? I’m like, I’m curious, what does Siemens call their I oh, now they call their I o modules. Signal modules. Right. Which is a slight difference. So I brought up the online uh tool here with Siemens. I said let’s see. And it’s digital modules digital and analog modules. Right. So you have digital and digital digital in out. Right. I’m like okay. So Siemens is using the word uh digital instead of discrete like Rockwell.

And uh, but but Schneider is using discrete and not that it’s a big deal. Again, I’m doing this part as a, you know, tongue in cheek picking on some of my competition or uses the wrong terminology with the wrong brands, but also just to test out. And we already found some some mistakes already, but with the Restream. But in any case, before buying Restream, I want to test it out to make sure it does what I want it to do. So in any case. So I’m like, okay, Sean, are you are you sure Rockwell uses the word digital, right? And I remember this letter coming out twenty years ago saying, you know, digital, discrete, blah, blah, blah. I don’t remember the detail. So I said, let’s go up and look at the latest control logics IO module, um, selection guide and or control logic selection guide. And you can see right here very clearly they call them digital input and output modules. Let’s see if we go down we see some more of these.

Okay. So the IB sixteen being one of the most popular ones. So I checked around and compact logics was the same. And I’m like well let’s go back in time. Let’s check. Uh slick five hundred. Yep. Digital I o and analog io. And I’m like, how about the flex back from the early nineties or mid nineties I should say. Yep. They use flex IO digital and analog okay. And I’m like, all right. Great. So these other people who claim to be experts aren’t using the right terminology with what they’re supposed to be an expert with. That tells you something, right? That tells you something. But I’m like, can I find any instance where Rockwell uses the word discrete? Right. So I came over to the selection guide for the Micrologix digital I o. Okay. Not discrete good.

So I said, you know what? I’m just going to search the knowledge base. Um, actually the literature library on ABC.com, I’m going to say let’s look for anything that has the word discrete in it, because I know I’ve seen this word before with Rockwell, and I did find a few. There’s only twenty results out of the entire, I don’t even know, hundreds of thousands of literature out there that had discrete. And so I wanted to pick out a few that relate to plc I o cards that use the word discrete. And so here we have some of the old block I o. I actually got some will be adding that in the PLC course I’m filming. I will be doing that on remote I o but the old block I o you can see this manual. And what was the year on this? Let me just go to the. Sometimes you have to go to the back nineteen ninety four. And they’re calling it the block I o discrete I o blocks okay. So that’s an example right. And then there was another one here. Right.

For I o Ponyo installation instructions. They use the word discrete as well. I thought that was interesting. What year is that from? Uh, well, it was updated in twenty. It’s twenty twenty five. So. So, you know, apparently they’re okay with using interchanging the terms here and there. And then I found this old compact io um, release note that called them discrete IO module. So my question to you is what do you call them. Now I know there’s there’s like twenty. And these all are some of these have to do with um machines with sensors, light arrays and all that kind of stuff. There’s very few, probably under ten documents you can find on Rockwell’s. Um, I’m just checking to make sure the video is coming out on Rockwell’s, uh, literature library. That will refer to IO module as discrete versus digital. And I already showed you at the beginning here, you know, all the current literature and all the old literature really had a preference for digital IO and that that kind of just reinforced when I was doing that. Modern, um, video. I was like, I keep saying digital, but the modules say discrete. Where did this where did this digital come from? It’s the vast majority of Rockwell’s documentation. Call it digital IO not discrete, but I’m curious, what do you use?

Do you say digital IO or discrete IO? And do you agree with me that if you’re working with Rockwell or Siemens, as we saw on their website, that you should be using the term digital? But when you’re working with Schneider, at least the edge io nts, you should be using the term discrete. And I know it doesn’t matter one bit, but, you know, hey, if I’m going to test out the studio and the mic and the video camera, it might as well might as well have something to chat about, right? This is automation Tech Talk, Lunchtime Edition, and I thought this might be a fun little topic to talk about again. Does it really matter? No. But, um, you know, one of the things I try to do is pay attention to the different, um, vendors terminology because I don’t like getting it wrong myself. Right.

And so in any case, I just thought that would be something fun to talk about. Now, I don’t know if because I’m trying out Restream. I don’t know if I’ll be able to see any chat to see if anybody’s chatted. So let me see if I can do that. Uh. I would need that. Okay, great. So I don’t see anything in the chat, and, um. Which is fine. As a matter of fact, uh, Restream seems to be a long way behind me. So if you’re. You may just be watching this now, it looks like Restream is, like, five, ten minutes behind me, which is really weird. I don’t know why they would be so far behind, but. Oh, well, it doesn’t matter.

In any case, uh, I just a couple of things that I’m working on right now in case this video is working. Um, the first thing is, um, we are working on a second video on the indie three hundred sixty. That’s what I’ll be doing right after this. And then, um, with that, we have another video coming up on Prtg that was sponsored, and they’ve had some people come and go and had some time problems scheduling it. But I do want to show how to use that TRG with um, uh, factorytalk view, which I thought would be cool. And then we got a lot of new. I got a lot of new demos to make. Um, we covered most of the demo one, Siemens, one I have, I have a bunch of other third party products and some Rockwell products. I’m going to make those demo boards up for in-person training. If you know anybody who needs in-person training, tell them to reach out to me.

I’m going to be actually sending fliers out, uh, with a special if people want to buy a block in time for twenty twenty six to come to in-person training. And, um, so it’ll be a, it’ll be a discount, but that’ll be it. That discount won’t carry into twenty twenty six. So with that, I think that’s everything. Hope to have more of these. Again. We’ll have some more demos in the studio probably maybe in here depending on how this is working out. But in any case, um, look for more videos coming out this week, maybe some even some more lunchtime videos. And I want to wish you all good health and happiness. And until next time my friends. Peace.

Until next time, Peace ✌️ 

If you enjoy this episode please give it a Like, and consider Sharing as this is the best way for us to find new guests to come on the show.

Shawn M Tierney
Technology Enthusiast & Content Creator

Eliminate commercials and gain access to my weekly full length hands-on, news, and Q&A sessions by becoming a member at The Automation Blog or on YouTube. You'll also find all of my affordable PLC, HMI, and SCADA courses at TheAutomationSchool.com.