Comment by CaciaraAsAServi | Hacker News Reader

Comment by CaciaraAsAServi | Hacker News Reader

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CaciaraAsAServi

eh, eh, I know what you mean, but in my opinion most vendors are honestly putting effort into modernizing development practices; sure, they're the usual money-grubbers we all know and love ( not! :D ), and gatekeeping is strong, but on the other hand, the sector is so vast, you are dealing with a culture which is so dragged back by past traditions, and last but not least, one's "gatekeeping" is the other's "professionalism".

Edit: Not to say that most of the times we are talking about small operations, where the PLC programmer is also electrician, plumber, chemical eng., mechanic, etc. ...

We are not only talking about big corps where hyperspecialization is the norm, the bulk of the users are (literally!) jack-of-all-trades, software is only a part, and in many cases a marginal one at that. People who have to do with PLCs are IMO far, far more diverse than the other kind of software developers.

Allen Bradley has 60-70% market share in the US, is objectively terrible and has been for a long time.

I meant "the most advanced" vendors ;-)

Our company developed for twincat3. Yes there is progress. And yes it is very slow. None the less - the inheritance & interfaces work. And the community produces great stuff - low and behold. A wild UnitTest framework for PLCs appears.

https://tcunit.org/

Im not pessimistic. Im just realistic. This is not enough speed to keep up with something disruptive brewed within AMZ or TESLA.

All they have to do is piss of a billionaire with delays one to many times..

> All they have to do is piss of a billionaire with delays one to many times..

...and nobody will follow their lead [as quickly as you comment seems to suggest].

I've just come out from a discussion with a customer (young guy, circa 30, not a "boomer"), head of a major wastewater treatment plant in my circa 4 million ppl. metro area...he doesn't trust software, he would rather put relays everywhere and go on like that.

The problem is not only the velocity of those who produce the systems, it is also the mentality at the end users' side.

This is why I say that the transition will be slower than it could be; there are so many parts involved.

If it only were a problem of "rate of innovation produced per unit of time" I would 100% agree with you (and not only 50% as I do :-) )

(BTW, any industrial automation person living in Northern Italy: be wary when working for the company whose name is like "ZIP code" in Italian, there is lots of work to do there, but the technical org is suuuuuch a mess)

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