Don’t let an import/export connection get confused with the integration. The number of devices integrated within a station have no bearing on the csv driver’s connection count. The way to think of a connection in the context of the csv driver is to think about the data flow.
So when you think about imports and exports:
- An import is best thought of as a single point of access that contains some csv data you need into Niagara.
- An export is any group of histories that exist within Niagara that you need to get out of Niagara.
Example 1: You have 500 histories in your station and need them to export out of the station. This requires a single export object which counts as 1 connection against the licensing. One export object will then give you the ability to now export all of these 500 histories to any of the supported export locations (email, file, ftp, url, etc.).
Example 2: You have a csv file sitting on an ftp server somewhere and need that data in Niagara. This requires 1 CsvFtpImport object which counts as 1 connection against the licensing.
Example 3: Let’s consider both examples above and now say we need to import data from an ftp and also export historical data out of ftp. Perhaps you needed to combine some third party csv import within niagara with existing integration data to do some calculations and then export the results out to another system for final evaluation. In this instance, you would have one import and one export object which would count as 2 connections against the licensing.