Write data to multiple Pi tags over a wide data range

Question

I need to write data(0s) to more than 100 tags over the span of 10 years. I only need one value per day, but that is still over 3500 values per tag.

PiImport will take too long, so I'm using piexam32. I populate the Timestamp column with a date per cell for 10 years, the Data Item column with the same tag and 0s in the Value column. Rinse and repeat for each tag.

Is there a simpler way to do this? Maybe one where I state the time range in a cell then reference it to have the data written for all the tags?

Edit: PiImport actually writes the data faster. I guess I'm just looking for a way to set this up and go to bed so I don't need to make any input until it is done

Alistair · Accepted Answer

I wrote this prompt to copilot: "I need a powershell script to write values to Aveva PI tags. There are more than 100 tags and they each need a 0 value to be inserted for the same time each day over a time period of 10 years." It came back with this: # Load the necessary PI AF SDK assembly
Add-Type -Path "C:\Program Files\PIPC\AF\PublicAssemblies\4.0\OSIsoft.AFSDK.dll"

# Connect to the PI Data Archive
$piServers = New-Object OSIsoft.AF.PI.PIServers
$piServer = $piServers["YourPIServerName"]

# List of PI tags
$tags = @("Tag1", "Tag2", "Tag3", ..., "Tag100") # Replace with your actual tag names

# Define the start and end dates
$startDate = [datetime]::Parse("2014-01-01")
$endDate = [datetime]::Parse("2024-01-01")

# Loop through each day in the date range
$currentDate = $startDate
while ($currentDate -lt $endDate) {
 foreach ($tag in $tags) {
 # Find the PI Point
 $piPoint = [OSIsoft.AF.PI.PIPoint]::FindPIPoint($piServer, $tag)

# Create the AFValue object with the value 0
 $afTime = New-Object OSIsoft.AF.Time.AFTime($currentDate)
 $afValue = New-Object OSIsoft.AF.Asset.AFValue(0, $afTime)

# Write the value to the PI Point
 $piPoint.UpdateValue($afValue, [OSIsoft.AF.Data.AFUpdateOption]::Replace, [OSIsoft.AF.Data.AFBufferOption]::BufferIfPossible)
 }

# Move to the next day
 $currentDate = $currentDate.AddDays(1)
}

Write-Host "Values inserted successfully." I've not tried it out at all and I've found that Copilot code sometimes needs a little adjusting but generally it can give a good place to start. An alternative, as you've already played with piexam32, is to take a copy of that and adjust the VBA code behind it to do similarly to the above Powershell script. This all depends on your programming experience of course!