Chapter 33. Field Controllers, Hardware and Software
W. Boyes
33.1. Introduction
In this section, we look at the hardware and software that take the measurements from the field sensors and the instructions from the control system and provide the instructions to the final control elements that form the end points of the control loops in a plant.
In the past 30 years, there have been amazing changes in the design and construction of field controllers and the software that operates on them, while there have been many fewer changes in the design of the final control elements themselves.
It all started with Moore's law, of course. In the April 1965 issue of
Electronics Magazine, Intel cofounder Gordon E. Moore described the doubling of electronic capabilities. ...
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