# PROSIM in the Cloud: Remote Automation Training Platform with Virtualized Infrastructure
## 1 Introduction  
Enabling remote automation technology training for higher education and continuing professional education requires suitable hardware-software platforms that leverage recent advances in cyberphysical systems and industrial internet of things. Specific topics include sensor technology, industrial communication, drive systems, programmable logic controllers and human-machine interfaces. Key design objectives are to enable easy knowledge transfer and practical expertise to the trainees, while balancing intuitive operations with the complexities that exist in a realistic plant or factory environment. Automation training is usually carried out in a dedicated, well-equipped laboratory that allows for physical implementation of the solution with failure simulations for increased realism. Recent public health challenges have accelerated the trend towards e-learning and virtual learning solutions, including for hands-on, resource-intensive fields such as industrial automation technology. This situation, overlapping an already-existing underlying trend for digitalization of Industry 4.0 education, has led to hybrid or fully virtual training courses where the student can initially gain expertise on the automation of a continuous process simulation followed by hands-on sessions in the laboratory. This represents, in some cases,significant time and cost benefits with added environmental advantages stemming from a reduction in the need for national or international travel. Secondary benefits can also be highlighted from the perspective of educational institutions, which are able to limit capital investments in hardware and easily scale a software solution depending on the number of students and the training courses that they follow every year. The long-expected lifespan of hardware equipment in industrial automation systems also supports the importance and interest in high-level proper automation training solutions. The PROSIM process simulation automation training system has been initially conceived as a practical solution for programmable logic controller (PLC) training that combines the commercial automation hardware with custom software. The concept is vendor agnostic, allowing for PLC hardware from any manufacturer to be used as long as it complies with the required number and type of input-output channels. An early version of the system with firmware-based microcontroller-level simulation is described in [1]. The system contains a Siemens S7-300 family PLC training board, including a power supply, central processing unit (CPU), analog and digital input-output modules, and a demonstration panel connected through physical input-output signal to the PLC. The demonstration panels includes lamps, switches and potentiometers for the interaction with the programmed logic together with detachable masks and a selector switch that allows the selection of the programming task according to the studied documentation. The following PLC programming languages are supported according to the IEC 61131-3: ladder diagram (LAD), statement list (STL) and function block diagram (FBD). An upgraded version (ASID) is presented in [2] where the microcontroller-based solution is replaced by a general-use embedded industrial PC with suitable RS-485 and Modbus data-acquisition modules (DAQ). The user interface is developed using C# programming language using the Microsoft Visual Studio integrated development environment (IDE) and Expression Blend environments. A launcher application allows the selection of and switching between various process simulations whereas the documentation, such as control narratives and i-o lists required by the student for PLC-side control logic implementation, is embedded into the application using contextual menus. A customized example of process simulations running on the ASID version for energy system modelling is carried out by [3]. These include an automatic circuit recloser, a burner system control and microgrid energy management system simulations.