Remote - Fall 2016 - 5

Editor's Choice Red Lion N-Tron Series Managed Switches Certified by ODVA to Meet CIP Specification Red Lion Controls have announced its latest firmware for the N-Tron series of NT24k and 700/7000 managed industrial Ethernet switches has been certified by ODVA to meet the requirements of the Common Industrial Protocol (CIP) specification. With embedded support for CIP, this broad industrial Ethernet switch portfolio provides ease of communication for industrial markets. Industrial factory automation customers, in these markets and others, require a vendor agnostic method for configuring and communicating with diverse devices in their industrial network. CIP was designed for use in process control and industrial automation applications. CIP provides consistent device access, allowing a single configuration tool to monitor and configure CIP devices without the need for vendor specific software. Red Lion's rugged NT24k and 700/7000 managed switches deliver information and configuration access directly to Human Machine Interfaces (HMIs) and Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs) through standard CIP messaging. "CIP is an important tool to communicate across diverse equipment. Compliance certification provides vendor-independent assurance that CIP-enabled products comply with the specification," said Diane Davis, director of product management, networking at Red Lion Controls. "This certification is just one more reason customers can trust Red Lion to seamlessly connect network infrastructures, linking the wide variety of devices common in today's industrial environments." With reliable plug-and-play operation, IGMP auto-configuration and fast boot time, the rugged NT24k and 700/7000 managed industrial switches include standard EtherNet/IP and are designed to provide optimal performance and maximum uptime in the harshest conditions. Red Lion's wide array of CIP-enabled managed switches, available in rackmount and DIN-rail mountable models, support a variety of port configurations and media types. Customers can now select from over 100 flexible configuration options that include 10/100/1000 Copper, Fast Ethernet, Gigabit Fiber and Power over Ethernet (PoE). EtherCAT Conformance Test Tool Version 2.0 Released The Technical Working Group for Conformance within the EtherCAT Technology Group (ETG) has released version 2.0 of the EtherCAT Conformance Test Tool (CTT), which features a significantly extended test set for EtherCAT devices. Manufacturers of EtherCAT slaves especially benefit from the new version, which is distinguished mainly by new functionalities for device configuration and EtherCAT development. Additionally, fully automated testing of EtherCAT devices in Distributed Clocks (DC) mode is now available. The EtherCAT Conformance Test Tool, or CTT, is the official reference tool for specifying compliant implementation of EtherCAT technology into EtherCAT slaves. The CTT enables the hundreds of EtherCAT device manufacturers to ensure reliable interoperability in the field. The first version of the CTT was created in 2008 and all subsequent updates have proven to be stable in practice. To maintain continuity, version 2.0 retains all functionalities and tests from the first version while adding impressive new features. With the updates in version 2.0, central extensions become available. Over and above the main job of the tool, which is to conduct device tests and detect possible errors, CCT 2.0 significantly extends functionalities that support and simplify EtherCAT development. This includes the ESI editor which can be used to edit the device description file, SII control to generate the EEPROM content, as well as additional functionalities such as the possibility to upload the object dictionary from the device and save it for the ESI. In parallel to the extensions of the new version, test coverage has been increased systematically, leading to a much higher number of possible test cases. Furthermore, CTT 2.0 supports the operation of devices in the highly accurate synchronization mode (Distributed Clocks) which can now be tested via a fully automated process. Additionally, one can create any number of configurations in one project for an EtherCAT slave - even automatically. This enables the developer to test the devices comfortably and quickly in all available configurations. The test results themselves can be exported for documentation into Microsoft Excel or .csv format. The test logic, and thus the tests themselves, are defined and released by a special working group within the EtherCAT Technology Group, the Technical Working Group for Conformance. The test software of the CTT, which conducts the logic defined in the tests and evaluates the behavior of the EtherCAT devices with the given logic, is developed and maintained by Beckhoff Automation. This ensures continuous development of the tool which also includes new functionalities in the built-in configurator, as well as support of all Windows operation systems, including the new 64-bit architecture. Remote Site & Equipment Management \ Fall 2016 5

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Remote - Fall 2016