I'm trying to communicate with an OPC DA server and need to write in a tag which is in an array format. We can connect with a simulation server, read tags (int, real, array) and write tags (int, real, str). The problem comes when we need to write in an array tag. The developper of the OpenOPC library (Barry Barnreiter) recommand to use a VARIANT variable because OPC "expect to see a Windows VARIANT structure when writing complex objects such as arrays".
Here's the code:
from win32com.client import VARIANT
import pythoncom
import OpenOPC
opc_local = OpenOPC.open_client()
opc_local.connect('Matrikon.OPC.Simulation','localhost')
values = VARIANT(pythoncom.VT_ARRAY | pythoncom.VT_R8, [1.0, 2.0, 3.0, 4.0, 5.0, 6.0])
w = opc_local.write(('Bucket Brigade.ArrayOfReal8', values))
print(w)
Here's the error that we get when the line with opc_local.write gets executed:
AttributeError: 'module' object has no attribute 'VARIANT'
Here's the entire traceback:
runfile('C:/Users/nadmin/Downloads/sanstitre0.py', wdir='C:/Users/nadmin/Downloads')
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "<ipython-input-5-6799f41ab928>", line 1, in <module>
runfile('C:/Users/nadmin/Downloads/sanstitre0.py', wdir='C:/Users/nadmin/Downloads')
File "C:\Users\nadmin\AppData\Local\Continuum\anaconda2\lib\site-packages\spyder_kernels\customize\spydercustomize.py", line 827, in runfile
execfile(filename, namespace)
File "C:\Users\nadmin\AppData\Local\Continuum\anaconda2\lib\site-packages\spyder_kernels\customize\spydercustomize.py", line 95, in execfile
exec(compile(scripttext, filename, 'exec'), glob, loc)
File "C:/Users/nadmin/Downloads/sanstitre0.py", line 14, in <module>
w = opc_local.write(('Bucket Brigade.ArrayOfReal8', values))
File "C:\Users\nadmin\AppData\Local\Continuum\anaconda2\lib\site-packages\Pyro\core.py", line 381, in __call__
return self.__send(self.__name, args, kwargs)
File "C:\Users\nadmin\AppData\Local\Continuum\anaconda2\lib\site-packages\Pyro\core.py", line 456, in _invokePYRO
return self.adapter.remoteInvocation(name, Pyro.constants.RIF_VarargsAndKeywords, vargs, kargs)
File "C:\Users\nadmin\AppData\Local\Continuum\anaconda2\lib\site-packages\Pyro\protocol.py", line 497, in remoteInvocation
return self._remoteInvocation(method, flags, *args)
File "C:\Users\nadmin\AppData\Local\Continuum\anaconda2\lib\site-packages\Pyro\protocol.py", line 572, in _remoteInvocation
answer.raiseEx()
File "C:\Users\nadmin\AppData\Local\Continuum\anaconda2\lib\site-packages\Pyro\errors.py", line 72, in raiseEx
raise self.excObj
And here's the configuration of the computer:
You need to upgrade the python to 3.9 and Pywin32 to Build 302. In addition, you need to install the OpenOPC-Python3x 1.3.1.
You have to change your line opc_local = OpenOPC.open_client() for opc_local = OpenOPC.client(). This will make you connect directly to the OPC server, as opposed to using the OpenOPC Gateway Service.
The VARIANT structure is not included inside the Gateway Service exe. Note that the Gateway Service exe is it's own frozen Python distribution. Thus it only includes the Python modules inside it that it needs to run and nothing else. So by avoiding using the Gateway Service you should not have this problem since you'll be executing your code entirely using the Python distribution that you installed yourself on your PC.
According to Python COM server throws 'module' object has no attribute 'VARIANT', the VARIANT class was introduced in Pywin32 build 217.
As you have included in your post that you have Pywin32 Build 223, this should not be a problem. But to be sure, from this list of available downloads: Home / pywin32 / Build 217, I would specifically select pywin32-217.win-amd64-py2.7.exe.
If that doesn't work, I would suggest checking the source of the configuration you listed; Do you only have one version of python installed? Perhaps you have multiple Python IDEs that could get mixed up? These are some common cases that can cause confusion in fixing bugs.