009 - EtherCAT application integration
Introduction
This document provides a quideline on how to create an EtherCAT application.
Provided example
The example 2015013_irj45/ac/09_ecat_slave implements a EtherCAT slave with common feature set:
object dictionary with objects of arbitrary data type
processing of cyclic process data and acyclic parameter data
configuration of the module regarding firmware update
The application consists of the following componts:
component | function | remark |
|---|---|---|
appl/2015013_irj45/ac/09_ecat_slave/goal_appl | application initialization module | starts and configures EtherCAT stack |
appl/2015013_irj45/ac/09_ecat_slave/goal_appl_ecat | EtherCAT stack event handling | this module handles events provided by the EtherCAT stack. Handling of process data and acyclic parameters is handled there too. |
appl/2015013_irj45/ac/09_ecat_slave/goal_appl_ecat_objects | EtherCAT object dictionary creation | this module creates all objects of the EtherCAT object dictionary |
appl/2015013_irj45/ac/09_ecat_slave/goal_appl_ecat_foe | application specific FoE handling | this module implements the application specific FoE support |
appl/2015013_irj45/ac/09_ecat_slave/goal_appl_http | application specific HTTP content | this module implements the web server provided by the example application |
appl/2015013_irj45/ac/09_ecat_slave/esi/09_ecat_slave_port.bin | SII configuration data | this binary needs to be programmes into the EEPROM of the EtherCAT slave for the application to work. this is usually done using EtherCAT configuration tools |
appl/2015013_irj45/ac/09_ecat_slave/esi/09_ecat_slave_port.xml | ESI file | this configuration file provides a device description for EtherCAT configuration tools (PLC) |
Some additional properties of the EtherCAT example are documented in this application note: https://portgmbh.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/IRJ45SOM/pages/138838019 .
Application creation
All listed components of a EtherCAT application need to be in sync. Therefore it can help to create the bare structure of a EtherCAT application using ports Industrial communication creator https://portgmbh.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/ICCX .
Once the application skeleton is created, the application specific function can be implemented using the provided API of the EtherCAT stack: https://portgmbh.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/IRJ45SOM/pages/222822674 .