CLICK PLUS: Secure PLC Email - from AutomationDirect

The CLICK PLUS PLC has secure email messaging that allows for transmission of alerts, alarms, and other important status updates. To use email on your CLICK PLUS PLC you must have a CLICK PLUS CPU and running CLICK programming software 3.40 and above. First, we must set up the email client. This can be done by going to the function tab here - then email setup. Select to enable the client. Here you can select to send emails over the ethernet protocol on Port 1, or if you have a WIFI based CLICK PLUS CPU, over the wireless LAN. If you are using one of these web-based email servers, it will fill out the important server information with these settings for you. Since the server name is used, instead of an IP address, you will need to set up DNS for this to function correctly. This is done under the port configuration. I typically just use the Google DNS server. Fill out the sender name. This can be any valid text and will be the name that the receiver will see in the email. The sender email needs to be a valid email address. Since I selected Gmail as my account type, this encryption setting is auto-assigned. Contact your service provider for information on your server settings. Enter your authentication for your email account. If you are using Gmail, make sure to check the help file for this client; it has instructions on creating an APP password for this type of setup. There is also a link in the description below that will take you to this document. I would advise having the email troubleshooting selected - this sets up a buffer that the email log function can read that will help in diagnosing any problems with emails sent. The address book provides a single location to store and maintain email addresses that can be used in the project. You can set up to 32 addresses that can be stored in the address book. That completes the client setup. Now, let’s set up an email to be sent. Grab the email instruction here and drop it into your ladder code. Here you can select your email addresses from your address book. For the subject, you can build your subject message here. This allows you to enter static text, embed a memory address, or embed a discrete message. You can also opt to create a pure dynamic text message by using a range of TXT addresses. Like with the subject builder, you can do the same here for the email body. I will add a simple test text with quotation marks and add in the real-time clock seconds address, just so we can see some dynamic text. I recommend adding the status flags as it will help with troubleshooting later. Select ok. To trigger this email message, I will use a rising edge contact with an internal bit. I'll trigger this bit from a data view later. Now send the project to your CPU. I will open up the data view, add my contact, and then enable editing. I will double-click here to turn on the contact. Here we see that the email was successfully sent. Now that the email has been sent, we can view the email log. At the ribbon bar at the top select PLC, check event records, and email log. From our email log, we can see the important information on the email sent. This will be a big help if you have errors. If you have any questions on this or any other feature on the CLICK PLUS please comment below. Click here to see more videos on the CLICK PLUS line and make sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel for new products and solutions.