Add Unsupported EtherCAT Device


  • This procedure is for advanced users only

When your project contains EtherCATClosed***EtherCAT is an open, high-performance Ethernet-based fieldbus system. The development goal of EtherCAT was to apply Ethernet to automation applications which require short data update times (also called cycle times) with low communication jitter (for synchronization purposes) and low hardware costs devices that are not supported by KAS, you have to create the configuration with an external tool, and perform the following steps:

  1. Get the AKD device description ESI file from the official AKD distribution
  2. Ensure all the device description ESI files are available for the external tool
  3. Use the external tool and do all the configuration, including the following points:
  4. Use the external tool to export the ENI description file
  5. In KAS, Import the ENI file describing all the EtherCAT devices included in your project

How to modify the EtherCAT image in cyclic mode

In your application program, when integrating non-standard EtherCAT devices, use the following function blocks to update EtherCAT frame:

How to configure EtherCAT device

You need to use the following Functions Blocks:

How to map PLC variables

When you use an XMLClosed"Extensible Markup Language " XML is a general-purpose markup language. It is classified as an extensible language because it allows its users to define their own tags network description file generated with an external configurator, you need to add special tags to the PDO names to ensure the PLC variables can be mapped to IO channels. The tags must comply with the following convention:

@Scope.VariableName+StartBit-Size

Field

Description

@

prefix with character @ the PLC variable names of each of the image attributes that must be mapped

Scope

Scope can be:

Parentheses must surround the scope when it is Global or Retain.

+StartBit

(Optional) Integer that defines the bit from which the data must be written or read from the PLC variable

-Size

(Optional) Integer that defines the number of consecutive bits in the image which must be copied to/from the PLC variable. When present, this setting has precedenceClosedIn arithmetic and algebra, when a number or expression is both preceded and followed by a binary operation, a rule is required for which operation should be applied first. From the earliest use of mathematical notation, multiplication took precedence over addition, whichever side of a number it appeared on. Thus 3 + 4 × 5 = 5 × 4 + 3 = 23. To change the order of operations, we use parentheses (). Thus, if we want to force addition to precede multiplication, we write (3 + 4) × 5 = 35 over the <BitSize> tag of the XML file.

Examples:

(Global).MachineState
(Global).bLedStatus:0-1
(Global).bLedStatus:1-1
(Global).myINT:+4
main.variable:3+4-8

  • This convention is applicable for simple variables. KAS does not yet support mapping for Structs and Arrays.

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