8. Glossary#

Plant and app terms an operator meets in Ring, in alphabetical order. Each entry is anchored to code or an authoritative document — a term you expect to see here but don't is one this review could not verify with confidence (see the note in each chapter's "Sources verified" list, and the caller's summary of this manual, for what was deliberately left out).

BOL#

Bill of Lading — the supplier's paperwork stating what a bulk delivery was supposed to contain. Main Screen → Receiving Verification records the BOL (expected) weight against the blown-in (actual) weight and shows the variance immediately. See 03a-main-screen-reference.md §Receiving Verification.

CIP#

Clean-In-Place. The plant's tank-cleaning cycle. Reports → Tank / CIP Board shows per-tank clean/dirty/in-use state, last-cleaned time, and when CIP is next due; operator marks there are recorded in Ring's own database only, never written to the PLC.

Demo mode#

Feeds every screen with synthetic data instead of the real controller, for training — shown by a bright yellow banner across the top of every screen. Set per station, either in the config file or from Setup → Plant Profile → Enable Demo / Training Mode (supervisor-gated); either way the change takes effect on Ring's next restart, not immediately. See 01-getting-started.md.

Doser tank#

One of the plant's final "use" tanks that actually doses glue to the corrugator line — what the app's Use Tanks screens (MF 1, and the hidden MF 2 / Double Backer slots) show. The plant's tank count is 1 mix + 6 storage + 6 doser tanks (13 total, per the repository README).

Dry starch (derived)#

Dry-starch pounds used, computed from formula amounts and solids percentages rather than read from any scale on the floor — every place this manual shows it (the Dashboard KPI strip, the Glue Usage Report, Dry lbs / sq ft) says so as "derived, not measured." See 03-screens-reference.md §The KPI strip and 06-reports-and-history.md.

Formula bank#

The controller's own set of six recipe slots (Formula_01…Formula_06) — the only formula numbers the plant can actually run a batch from. Formula numbers above 6 exist only in Ring's database. See 05-formulas-and-recipes.md.

Freshness chip#

A small green LIVE / amber STALE / grey NO DATA indicator (dot + label) that appears on several screens (Storage Tank Group, Use Tank Group, MF 1, the Dashboard's tank rail) to say how current the data behind that specific card or screen is — distinct from, and more specific than, the single global PLC connection banner. See 01-getting-started.md §PLC connection indicator.

Giveaway#

The cost of dosing more than a formula called for — the gap between Requested and Actual on the Yield / Giveaway Report, and one of the figures behind the Yield Scorecard on Reports → Insights. See 06-reports-and-history.md §Spend, yield and usage.

Golden batch#

A reference temperature curve built from a set of past "good" batches for a formula. Reports → Golden Batch Overlay compares a live or selected batch's temperature against it and reports the current and maximum deviation — a way to see at a glance whether today's batch is tracking normally.

Heartbeat#

A counter (PC_Read_Integer[0]) the controller's own main logic increments continuously. Ring watches whether it is still advancing to judge whether the controller is not just reachable but actually running — see the PLC connection indicator states (Connected / Stale / Starved / Disconnected).

HOLD (batch state)#

A third state of the status strip's batch pill, distinct from RUNNING and IDLE — shown when the controller's own status word reports the system held. It overrides RUNNING even if a step index is still set, because the step number does not change while the plant is held and so cannot reveal a hold on its own. See 02-running-batches.md §Monitoring a batch in progress, in detail.

LCP#

Line Control PC. The touchscreen workstation on the floor that runs Ring (and, before cutover, ran ~RS360 alongside it).

Make Ready Tank (MRT)#

The mix tank — a batch is made here, then pumped out to a storage tank. It sits upstream of the storage tanks, not between them and the line (that position is the use/doser tanks): the app's own Live Process screen draws the train as SUPPLY → MIXING (Make Ready Tank) → DISTRIBUTION (storage tanks). Main Screen → Make Ready Tank shows its weight, temperature, borax/caustic weight, the current step with mix-time remaining, the destination storage tank, and the full step table — see 3a. There is no setpoint field and no Auto/Manual mode control anywhere on this screen.

Mix tank#

See Make Ready Tank (MRT) above.

MTTA / MTTR#

Mean Time To Acknowledge / Mean Time To Resolve — the two response-speed figures on Reports → Alarm Analytics, averaged over the report's date range. See 06-reports-and-history.md §Alarm Analytics.

OEE#

Overall Equipment Effectiveness — an availability figure computed on Reports → Downtime / OEE from operator-logged downtime events (there is no readable PLC hold/stop tag this could be derived from automatically). See 06-reports-and-history.md §Downtime / OEE.

Playbook (alarm)#

A per-alarm-number entry (meaning, first check, who to call) shown read-only on the Alarms screen and maintained under Setup → Alarm Playbook Editor. See 04-alarms-and-attention.md.

Read-only mode#

Ring's pre-cutover default: every control that would send a command to the controller is shown and validated, but the write itself is suppressed. Signalled by a persistent teal banner. See 01-getting-started.md (source for the full write-safety model: README.md "The safety model" in the Ring repository).

RS3000 vs. RS360#

RS3000 is this modern application's own product name (the window title reads "Ringwood RS3000"). ~RS360 is the older Borland application it replaces. The two names are easy to confuse; see 07-troubleshooting.md.

Shelved alarm#

An alarm hidden from the active list on Reports → Alarm Summary for a set time, listed separately in its own collapsed section rather than removed. Shelving is a display/audit aid only — it never changes PLC alarm detection, email, or escalation, and a shelved alarm that is still genuinely live is flagged as such rather than disappearing silently. See 06-reports-and-history.md §Alarm Summary.

Solids %#

The percentage of a batch's contents that is solid starch rather than water, printed per batch on the Glue Usage Report alongside the derived dry-starch figure. See 06-reports-and-history.md.

Splitting (Type A / Type B)#

On a Batch Start screen, two independent choices for routing part of a batch to a second storage tank. Type B can only name a tank if Type A also does — see 02-running-batches.md.

Stalled (step)#

A live formula step that has run longer than roughly 2 minutes or 3× its own preset mix time, whichever is greater — flagged amber on the Dashboard and Make Ready Tank step trackers as a warning that something downstream may be stuck. It is a warning, not an alarm or a fault by itself. See 03-screens-reference.md §The formula/operations panel.

Starved (PLC state)#

One of the four PLC connection states, between Stale and Disconnected: the network link is up, but the controller's own heartbeat counter has stopped advancing — its logic isn't running, so most values simply stop flowing even though Ring can still reach it. Shown as a deep-amber dot with "PLC reachable but heartbeat stopped." See 01-getting-started.md §PLC connection indicator.

Storage tank#

One of the plant's 6 bulk tanks that a batch is started on (Batch Start, Storage Tank Group).

TVC#

Temperature / Viscosity Control. The system that holds a tank at its target temperature; Main Screen → TVC shows a read-only overview of current temperature vs. preset, heater state and control mode for the storage tanks' TVCs.