Creating Base PLC Variables - LS Electric XGB PLC from AutomationDirect

Any XGB project will need to use PLC variables. To create a PLC variable in the software, we go to the project window on the left side of the screen and double click on Global/Direct variables. This brings up the Global/Direct variables screen. On the “Global Variable” tab, we see all currently created global variables. This will include any automatically generated variables based on our expansion I/O modules. To create a new variable, scroll all the way to the bottom of the list, and start typing a new variable name. Once we finish the variable name, we will press enter and the variable will be created in the project. It will automatically assign the variable kind and the data type. Both can be edited by using the drop down for each column. The “Address” column can be used to tie this global variable to a specific direct variable. If we select an address for a different variable type than we have selected, the software will give us an error message. The “Initial Value” column can be used to control the value of the variable when the PLC starts scanning. The “Retained” column determines whether a variable value will be retained through power loss. The “Used” column indicates if the variable is used anywhere in the project. The “EIP/OPC UA” column is used to make a variable accessible by an Ethernet/IP or OPC network connection, and the “HMI” checkbox is used in tandem with an LSElectric Human Machine Interface. Finally, the “Comments” column is used to allow the programmer to annotate what the variable will be used for. XG5000 supports a spreadsheet style variable editing method to create variables with ascending numbers. Some of the useful features of spreadsheet software are possible in XG5000 as well. If we right-click on any line, we can insert or add a new line or delete the existing line. If we click and drag on the number column on the far left or shift-click two separate lines, we can select multiple lines. If we select multiple lines, we can either use the insert function to insert an equal number of new lines, or delete them all. If we create a variable called Slot0_Input_00 in the global variable tab, we can then use a spreadsheet style click+drag copy function to have the software automatically index the variable number as it moves down the lines. This also applies to any direct variables we assign, as well as variable kinds and types. These are all extremely useful tools for creating variables, and especially similarly named variables quickly and easily.