A couple of Corso Systems Engineers were working in Southern California on a long term project. Given the fact that Andrew Geiger has yet to be seen without his train engineer’s cap on, there may have been a bias towards one of Planes, Trains, or Automobiles. When it came time for our engineers to go home to the Northeastern part of the US, it was easy to decide on an Amtrak trek across the country!

Not Just Epic…Groov Epic

Instead of just spending a few days staring out the window, they decided to have some fun. At Corso Systems, we’ve been doing a lot of work with Opto22 Groov Epic controllers recently. Since Opto22 is located in Southern California, it was easy to obtain some of their controllers, along with GPS tracking devices. We could now track the location of the train in real time as it made its way across the US. Since we had been working in Ignition using the Perspective Module—specifically with the built-in map component—it was a natural fit for us to build a Perspective app to track the trip.

While Andrew and Jason were figuring out the hardware, we had a couple folks at Corso Systems setting up the backend systems to receive the GPS coordinate data from the MQTT data stream pushed from Opto22’s Groov Epic controller on board the train. We ingested this data using Cirrus Link’s MQTT Engine Module on our Ignition gateway. Then, it was pushed out onto a map on the tracking system we built so that everyone at Corso Systems could monitor the journey.

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words

We quickly realized watching Perspective slowly daw a line from LA to DC wasn’t very exciting. But, our Slack channels were blowing up whenever cell service was available on the train to share photos. We figured that a trip around the country needed pictures, and Andrew and Jason were taking plenty. So it was time to put technology to good use and place the photos on the map.

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We grabbed a Python Library to retrieve location information from the images, then put the images on the map at the exact coordinates where each photo was taken. We set up the system so that each picture would automatically appear on the map as it uploaded from the server—after it slowly arrived from the sparse and weary cell towers strewn about the route. Additionally, we set up the map so you could click each image and zoom in to view details.

Now we could see where our engineers were on their route home—while also experiencing some of their journey through their photos.

Ignition Community Live

While this was a fun journey across the country (maybe even more so for everyone NOT on the train), part of the project goal was to encourage community outreach. We took advantage of Inductive Automation’s Community Live webinar series to host our own webinar focused on map-based SCADA solutions.

We enjoyed sharing this cross-country image and tracking project, our Covid-19 case tracking application, and some exciting work focused on the global supply chain to track shipments around the country. Not only does MES apply within the walls of a facility, the supply chain disruptions of the past few years have demonstrated the importance of full visibility of everything that goes into manufacturing a product.

This was an exciting project! It was a great way to transform travel photos and tracking data, and combine them in a non-traditional way with technology we use at Corso Systems to make a truly unique Perspective app experience!

Updated - 6/13/2022