You’re spot-on; I haven’t configured ANY ignition apps. But I have used nearly every HMI product to hit the market in the last decade and as a general rule, they don’t differ much. There are two engineers in our company that have been through your training and hold your product in high regard. I certainly don’t disagree because I would have no basis for that opinion; however, I remeber a conversation, that could have just as well been the one that we are having, with a Citect engineer five years ago. After a significant amount of my time invested in the product, I found it to be lacking when compared against the claims (web deployed, extensible, etc…)
In regards to the ArchestrA platform, it is, unquestionably, the most powerful SCADA tool on the planet when put into the hands of a engineer that understands what it can do and “gets” the big picture of SCADA in a manufacturing environment. Having said that, there is no plausible way to justify it’s price.
Maybe what I need to do is, as you suggest, get into the meat and potatoes of ignition and then pull out your SDK and see if I can get it to do what I’d like it to. Please, understand that I am not, in any way, shape or form, being critical of your product; I don’t yet have the tribal knowledge necessary.