I/O batches are provided by I/O drivers. I/O drivers must be installed using plugins. Depending on the driver, an I/O batch may be linked to a specific device, a specific communications bus, or it may be completely independent. The association between an I/O batch and the I/O points it queries or writes is also driver specific. Usually, however, the I/O point will have some sort of configuration parameter to specify which I/O batch it should be included in.

Here are some examples of what an I/O batch may do:

Send a read or write command using a protocol like the Modbus protocol,
Scan the inputs of a physical I/O board installed on the computer,
Write to the outputs of a physical I/O board installed on the computer,
Execute a query to a relational database, or
Send a command to a cloud service using a web service interface like REST or SOAP

Executing I/O Batches

I/O batches must usually by triggered when the values of the I/O points need to be read or written. The I/O batch will usually expose one or more tasks that allow you to query the data and/or send the commands as part of a timer, or in response to an event. The exact name or names of the tasks depend on the driver. Please refer to the documentation of the specific I/O batch for details.

Accessing I/O Batches

I/O batches have at least the following members:

Attributes

key	The I/O batch’s primary key.
name	The I/O batch’s name. The name is the last component of the primary key.
UUID	The unique UUID of the I/O batch.

Each individual type of I/O batch can have additional members. Most I/O batches will have a task to process the batch, for example. Please refer to the documentation of the specific I/O batch for details.

To refer to a member, use its primary key. The primary key of the UUID attribute of an I/O batch called “My.I/O.Batch” is “My.I/O.Batch.UUID”.

Table of Contents

Executing I/O Batches

Accessing I/O Batches