Node-RED
Node-RED is a popular tool that enables workflow-based programming for wiring together hardware devices, APIs and online services in new and interesting ways. It runs on a variety of platforms, e.g. PLC controllers, edge devices, virtual machines or even native services in the cloud. It is a simple open source visual editor for wiring Internet-of-Things services and devices.
The system contains so-called “nodes” that look like icons that can be placed on the canvas and wired together by using drag-and-drop. Each node offers a different functionality. For example, there are simple debug nodes to analyze/check the data flow or MQTT nodes that subscribe to data on a MQTT message broker and insert this data into the workflow. Node-RED can be extended by plugins to enrich its functionalities.
TwinCAT IoT can be used to send machine data to Node-RED and receive commands from the Node-RED workflow. In addition, other TwinCAT functions may be used as well, e.g. the TwinCAT TCP/IP Server.
Node-RED includes built-in support for multiple communication protocols, e.g. MQTT, HTTP, Raw TCP/IP, and so on.
In order to connect TwinCAT IoT via MQTT with a Node-RED workflow, a message broker is required as an intermediate. Another alternative would be to use TwinCAT IoT HTTPS/REST with the built-in HTTPS/REST web server of Node-RED.