History
Opto 22 was founded in 1974 as a manufacturer of solid state relays. The company soon expanded its offerings to include a variety of computer-based industrial automation, remote monitoring, and data acquisition products. In 1978, Opto 22 developed the first computer-based plug-in I/O modules, and created the now universally accepted Yellow-Black-White-Red color scheme used to identify digital AC input, digital AC output, digital DC input, and digital DC output modules respectively.
In 1982, the company created Optomux, a serial-based I/O system using the ASCII protocol that remains popular to this day. The following year, with the introduction of the personal computer prompting a shift in the automation industry to PC-based control, Opto 22 developed what was to be the first in a series of software packages for designing control strategies on a PC using flowcharts. This provided a new alternative to the more popular ladder logic programming model. Later, Opto 22 introduced the mistic controller, which had many of the same features and functionality of a modern programmable automation controller.
Today, Opto 22 is best known for its "SNAP" brand of Ethernet I/O products, including industrial processors, controllers, I/O racks and modules, software and accessories. In 2007 the company introduced the SNAP PAC System, unifying the aforementioned elements into a fully integrated platform, adding higher powered programmable automation controllers with redundant Ethernet communications, new programming and HMI development software, higher density I/O modules, database connectivity tools and software that simulated the SNAP PAC controller hardware. The result was a suite of control system components, suitable for simple cell control or complex, distributed control architectures.
Read more about this topic: Opto 22
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“Three million of such stones would be needed before the work was done. Three million stones of an average weight of 5,000 pounds, every stone cut precisely to fit into its destined place in the great pyramid. From the quarries they pulled the stones across the desert to the banks of the Nile. Never in the history of the world had so great a task been performed. Their faith gave them strength, and their joy gave them song.”
—William Faulkner (1897–1962)
“There is no example in history of a revolutionary movement involving such gigantic masses being so bloodless.”
—Leon Trotsky (1879–1940)
“There is no history of how bad became better.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)