Communication subscriber or communication method for communication with a field bus and a network

• US 7,991,936 B1
• Filed: 11/16/2000
• Issued: 08/02/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 11/17/1999
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Siemens AG
• Original Assignee: Siemens AG
• Inventors: Gehring, Hubert, Plaum, Reiner, Biehler, Georg, Lange, Ronald, Talanis, Thomas
• Primary Examiner(s): Misiura; Brian T
• Assistant Examiner(s): Patel; Nimesh G
• Application Number:
  US10/130,228
• Time in Patent Office: 3,911 Days
• Field of Search: 710/305, 709/203
• US Class Current: 710/305
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/4641 Virtual LANs, VLANs, e.g. virtual private networks [VPN] LAN interconnection over a bridge based backbone H04L12/462; encapsulation techniques H04L12/4633; routing of packets H04L45/00; packet switches H04L49/00; virtual private networks for security H04L63/0272
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2012/40221 Profibus
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2012/40273 the transportation system being a vehicle
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2101/627 Controller area network [CAN] identifiers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/106 across networks, e.g. mapping telephone numbers to data network addresses

Abstract

A communications subscriber (P) which is suitable as an interface between a network (N) and a field bus (BU) and has software objects (A′, B′) for representing appliances (A, B) which can be connected via the field bus, which software objects can be addressed, like the appliances (A, B) themselves, via the network (N), so that appliances having only field bus access can also be transparently incorporated into “high performance” networks.

Claims

1. A communications subscriber interface between a network and a field bus, comprising:

the communications subscriber connected to the network, and

the field bus connected to the communications subscriber,

said communications subscriber having terminal-specific software objects representing, from the point of view of the network, terminals connected to the field bus as an instance of an object type, which terminals cannot be reached directly via the network, and which terminal-specific software objects provide a collection of input and/or output data and/or methods which is geared to the respective functionalities of the terminals and can be used to access these functionalities,

wherein the software objects can be addressed via the network using a transfer protocol defined for the network, in exactly the same way as the communications subscriber itself or other communications subscribers, and

wherein the field bus synchronizes an address space which is shared by the communications subscriber and the terminals and can be mapped at least in a shared memory of the communications subscriber, and

wherein a particular software object representing a particular terminal includes a table that specifies data access paths corresponding to different functions associated with the particular terminal, including;

at least one first table entry for a first function associated with the particular terminal, the at least one first table entry specifying an access path to the particular terminal via the field bus, such that upon receiving a request for the first function at the communications subscriber via the network, the particular software object executes the first function by communicating with the particular terminal via the field bus; and

at least one second table entry for a second function associated with data communicated from the particular terminal to the shared memory and maintained in the shared memory, the at least one second table entry specifying an access path to the shared memory and within the communications subscriber, such that upon receiving a request for the second function at the communications subscriber via the network, the particular software object executes the second function by communicating with the shared memory and without communicating with the particular terminal, such that the field bus is relieved of load.

2. The communications subscriber according to claim 1, wherein the number of software objects is adjusted in a freely definable manner, so as to suit the number of terminals connected to the field bus.

3. The communications subscriber accordingly to claim 1, wherein the software objects can be assigned unique addresses within the network which are suitable for targeted data transfer in line with the transfer protocol provided for the network.

4. The communications subscriber according to claim 3, wherein the addressed software object carries out preprocessing for the data in a received message.

5. The communications subscriber according to claim 1, further comprising a software object having a table containing at least one table element, where the table element can store at least one address and a dimension information item for a data item, the address being the address of an input or output value exported by the terminal and relating to a shared address space in the field bus, and the dimension information item being a memory space requirement for the input or output value in the address space.

6. A method of communication for communication between a control computer (LR) and at least one terminal (A, B), the method comprising:

connecting the control computer to a network (N);

connecting the at least one terminal to a communication subscriber (P) via a field bus, which communication subscriber synchronizes an address space shared by the communications subscriber and at least one terminal and can be mapped at least in a shared memory of the communications subscriber and which is suitable as an interface to the communications subscriber;

connecting the communications subscriber to the network, said communication subscriber having at least one terminal-specific software object for representing, from the point of view of the network, the at least one terminal as an instance of an object type, which terminal cannot be reached directly via the network, and wherein the at least one terminal-specific software object provides a collection of input and/or output data and/or methods which is geared to the respective functionalities of the at least one terminal and can be used to access these functionalities; and

addressing the software object via the network using a transfer protocol defined for the network in exactly the same way as the communications subscriber itself or other communications subscribers, and

receiving at the communications subscriber via the network a request for a particular function associated with the particular terminal represented by a particular software object,

accessing a table at the particular software object;

determining, based on the table, a data access path specified for the particular function, the table including;

at least one first table entry for a first type of function associated with the particular terminal, the at least one first table entry specifying an access path to the particular terminal via the field bus, such that if the received particular function is the first type of function, the particular software object executes the particular function by communicating with the particular terminal via the field bus; and

at least one second table entry for a second type of function associated with data communicated from the particular terminal to the shared memory and maintained in the shared memory, the at least one second table entry specifying an access path to the shared memory and within the communications subscriber, such that if the received particular function is the second type of function, the particular software object executes the particular function by communicating with the shared memory and without communicating with the particular terminal, such that the field bus is relieved of load.

7. The method of communication according to claim 6, wherein the number of software objects is adjusted in a freely definable manner so as to suit the number of terminals connected to a subnetwork.

8. The method of communication according to claim 6, wherein the software objects can be assigned unique addresses within the field bus which are suitable for targeted data transfer in line with the transfer protocol provided for the field bus.

9. The method of communication according to claim 6, wherein the addressed software objects representing the second communications subscriber carries out preprocessing for the data in the received message.

10. The method of communication according to claim 6, where the software objects have a table containing at least one table element, where the table element can store at least one address and a dimension information item for a data item, the address being the address of an input or output value exported by the terminal relating to the shared address space of the field bus, and the dimension information item being the memory space requirement for this input or output value in the address space.