dataPARC serves as a great hub for our various data sources. It's valuable to have data from different parts of the mill all in the same place and to be able to trend this data. The Graphics Designer tool allows you to build graphics that communicate a lot more information than a spreadsheet. The ability to easily build custom tags either using CALC tags or CTCCALCS tags is very powerful. This is one of the functions I use the most. This function allows you to use process values as variables in equations or formulas whose output can then be trended just like any other tag. This provides insights that you wouldn't necessarily receive from DCS data.

dataPARC’s simple ease of use combined with advanced calculations makes it useful for everyone on site. The integration of different displays in the Graphics Designer has allowed us to make some custom applications for the plant. In addition the ability to integrate multiple data sources has been priceless, we can now view most of our different systems with one interface. We have automated and streamlined a lot of the operational data analysis using dataPARC

The historian is adaptable to a variety of time-series data sources. Scripting and Server side calculations let one combine values from different sources to create new tag values. Built-in displays let one compare trends, see x-y relationships, view run-to-run comparisons, monitor centerline performance, and detect cyclical anomalies. Customizable graphics let one build both high-level at-a-glance overview displays as well as drill-downs to process details. One can configure buttons to open relevant web page reports or reports from 3rd party tools. Alarms can be configured to detect process excursions. Alarm events can be documented both by users (structured cause and text comments) and with automatically collected process data from the event to build a history for review and process improvement. PARCtask feature allows sending screen captures to selected recipients either on a set schedule or based on an event trigger. An Excel Add-in provides tools for extracting data for custom reporting or further analysis. It also has some nifty one-step custom charting tools.