The History of Rockwell Automation Technologies

This book begins with some background history of industrial control systems and the Rockwell Automation ecosystem. It is essential to understand the legacy systems provided by Rockwell Automation because some of them can still be found operating in the field today. Also, it is important to understand the overall Rockwell Automation offering, the terminology, and how the platforms we focus on in this book fit into that world.

In this chapter, we will introduce Rockwell Automation and provide a history of the evolution of their technologies, right up to the Logix platform. Due to the 15- to 20-year industrial controller lifespan, it is not uncommon to encounter older versions of hardware and firmware and so it is critical to understand their evolution.

The following topics will be covered in this chapter:

• Controlling equipment with water, air, and power

• A brief history of Rockwell Automation

• Understanding Integrated Architecture

In the first section of this chapter, we will look at the earliest examples of control systems in history.