RSLogix 5000(V15) TCP Sockets

dash

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I have posted the following over in the RSLogix forum, but maybe someone here knows the answer.
==============================================
I thought that I had read somewhere in the initial new features information that V15 would allow you to attach to a TCP socket on another device to read information from the device (bar code readers, weigh scales, etc.). I also thought that you could also create a server socket so that other remote devices could attach to the ControlLogix. I also seem to remember that all this required the 1756-EWEB module.

Now, what I can not seem to find is updated documentation on how to do all this neat new stuff. Does anyone know where that information may be found or am I completly mistaken.

Thanks,

Darren
 
As far as I know the EWEB module will in addition to having an

Ethernet/IP protocol also serve a web page. As such you will have capability to work with XML data.

In terms of using TCP sockets that capability has always been there. All you need to do is learn the Ethernet/IP and implement

it using TCP sockets. You will use TCP client.

I am not sure that you understand what TCP sockets are for.

TCP server (listener) and TCP client will allow you to exchange data over the TCP layer, however the structure of the data,
the application layer will be either the EtherNet/IP or the XML.
Using sockets is an easy part, implementing EtherNet/IP is not.
 
I was referring to the capability to open a client socket connection from within the ControlLogix programming environment. I would like to see where you are referring to that shows that feature has always been availble. There are many legacy devices that will support a TCP socket connection, but not EtherNet/IP. Many of these items I am referring to are attached to legacy VAX or mainframe applications. This capability would ease integration of older manufacturing systems.

Also, I am specifically referring to passing data through a socket connection in an ASCII format. Similar to what occurs in a TCP socket connection with a serial server attached to a barcode reader.

Darren
 
Actually this is not V15 related: Next FW revision (3.x) of 1756-EWEB will have socket interface. From what I heard it should be out this month.

dash is correct: The idea is to connect non Ethernet/IP capable devices to CLX.
 
I guess I was imagining things. I can not find any reference to opening a raw socket connection from within the ControlLogix, without using one of the ProSoft modules.

[Appears we cross posted] :D

At least now I know I was looking in the wrong place. I knew I had seen it because I was glad to see that there was one less piece of hardware possibly needed on a job. Just depends on how robust & ease of implimentation.

Darren
 
Last edited:
I am still confused by your terminology "raw socket connection".
All I can find on the EWEB module is this. It implements
a subset of ASP which allows you to take a tag and
convert it to XML. EWEB serves data in XML format so that
a generic PC application (VB or C++) can use the data
presented in a very simple format. Yes it is ASCII XML.
EtherNet/IP is also presented in ASCII. ASCII still needs some kind of protocol arrangement even if it is just a very simple
sequential data.
Web browser would use style sheets to convert it to HTML, but the whole idea is to present it in XML so that you can use
TCP client socket and parse the data with relative ease.
I don't understand where all this talk about sockets comes in?
Socket is just a way to get the data on to the Ethernet or get it from there. Data is still encoded in some format (protocol).

Apparently there is a utility called Data View in the
RSLogix5000 that is similar to the Monitor Tags utility.
Data View reads data from the EWEB, but unlike the Tag monitor you can specify individual tags.

Other than that I could not find anything else.
Anyways it is an interesting topic.
 
Jiri,

This feature has nothing to do with XML or EWEB, It actually will be implemented in ENBT later on.
It will enable processor to send and recieve RAW ASCII data to non-CIP capable devices.
Each device can be set TCP server or TCP client.
In case of TCP client Logix controller will create socket and open TCP connection to the server. After that it can read and write data from and to the device.
If it set as a TCP server, it will create socket and listen on specified port. It will establish connection per external request and will handle read/write requests.
 
I guess I was imagining things. I can not find any reference to opening a raw socket connection from within the ControlLogix, without using one of the ProSoft modules
No, this is a real feature, but I just want to make it clear:
this feature is not released yet and as far as I know nothing officially published.
 
Contr_Conn,
Now it makes much more sense. It is very interesting.
A so called RAW data will have to be organized in some way.
This is how I see it.
To send data you you will specify the
IP address of the target (a configuration) and specify the
array you want to send out. Array gets converted to ASCII format.
There will have to be a delimiter between values that could be made programmable also there will be an end of line character,
that could be made part of the setup config. So as far as transmitting data in a simple format we are OK. As far as receiving the data you will program in an IP addresses to look for and will subsequently know where the data came from.
Since you know where the data is coming from you know what type of data to expect. But how do you deal with headers and delimiters from the incoming data? How do you deal with
dissimilar types of data, for example a float represented in ASCII followed by an integer represented in ASCII?
Is there going to be scripting capability built into the ENBT?

As Dash is saying there are many generic devices in the field
communicating over Ethernet using some sort of RAW or generic ASCII, but no matter how RAW the data is it still has to have a structure which has to be dealt with on the receiving end.

Personaly I would put the VB script capability into the
ENBT.
 
As Dash is saying there are many generic devices in the field
communicating over Ethernet using some sort of RAW or generic ASCII, but no matter how RAW the data is it still has to have a structure which has to be dealt with on the receiving end.

Yep, that is my interest in locating a preliminary manual to kind of get an idea of what would be involved. I have not done much text parsing in the ControlLogix, so I am not really able to say how well it can handle text. I can comment on a different processor that we use to parse ASCII and send the results to the ControlLogix through a CIP I/O connection. Typically we parse all the ASCII in structured text, which makes it easier to extract, strip, format & concatenate. I would assume that the ControlLogix would be as capable within it's structured text environment (should be close to the VB script capability you are looking for) as the other processor we currently use for stuff like this.

Darren
 
Yes, thanks. I was planning to use version 15, but unfortunatly I have not been able to weasle any prerelease documentation/beta version out of our distributor.

Thanks,

Darren
 
Dash - If you haven't already checked it out, ******* has a product called DeviceMaster UP which offers legacy devices which typically communicate ASCII the ability to communicate via Ethernet/IP to the ControlLogix PLCs. Exactly as you had indicated having a need for.

If you are interested in evaluating one of these free of charge, please feel free to contact me diirectly.
 

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