[En-Nut-Discussion] Industrial interfaces (Modbus TCP, Profinet, etc.)

[Henrik Maier]

Hi Philip,

ProfiNet is not as easy as Modbus as it is not really open.

You can implement conformance Class A and B devices using standard 
Ethernet hardware. But Class C requires a special ASIC as the 
isochronous real-time requirements of Class C cannot be met with 
ordinary TCP/IP and Ethernet.

But the biggest impediment is not of technical nature but commercial.

In order to participate in the ProfiNet world you need unique vendor IDs 
and Indent numbers. In order to get those IDs registered, you have to 
get your device conformance tested (this is mandatory for ProfiNet) 
which is expensive and it is probably not commercially viable trying to 
achieve conformance with a homebrew stack. You would be better off 
licensing a commercial stack which is known to pass conformance test.

There are also various trademark licensing rules requiring you to become 
a paying member of the Profinet organisation in order to use the 
ProfiNet trademark in conjunction with your product.

Henrik


On 17/07/2014 4:31 AM, Philipp Burch wrote:
> Hi everyone,
>
> I'd like to ask if anyone of you has experience with integrating
> Ethernut-driven devices in industrial networks based on Ethernet.
> Sometime in the near future, we will need to implement some standardized
> industrial interface in one of our devices, such as Modbus TCP or
> Profinet. Does someone already have such code at hand by chance? I'm not
> concerned about Modbus TCP, this should be fairly simple to implement.
> But as far as I understand Profinet, this works below the transport
> layer, i.e. it does not (only) use TCP or UDP, but something different.
> Or are there other popular interfaces that could be a good choice? We do
> have an FPGA on that device, but I'd prefer to do the network stuff only
> in the microcontroller, so EtherCAT is not really an option.
>
> Thank you!
>
> Best regards,
> Philipp
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