Kithara presents EtherCAT Master 2.0

Hardware dependent programming in real-time is the demand of many sectors of industry, who are changing from legacy field bus protocols to flexible real-time Ethernet solutions. In that case a PC-based EtherCAT solution is prefered because of the easy implementation and the omission of hardware maintenance.

The Berlin company Kithara Software is co-exhibitor on the Hannover Fair 2010 and presents the completely revised EtherCAT Master from the »RealTime Suite« product line, which supports the new operating system Windows 7. PC-based implementation of industrial control applications is an enormous simplification of automation technology. Windows operating systems, though, are not able to deliver hard realtime offhand. This is addressed by a product range of Kithara, which is also containing the EtherCAT Master.

The modular function library provides a slim demand oriented code which can be integrated fast and easy into the own application with the help of the detailed documentation. Thusly, all needed mechanisms are provided to implement cost-effective flexible control applications based on EtherCAT. It is not necessary anymore for programmers to manage and transmit data telegrams by their own. Advantages are a high usability, a small practicing effort and therefore the reduction of time and costs.

The EtherCAT Master supports a very fast process data exchange and additionally mailbox communication, EoE and FoE and Distributed Clocks and is hot-plug compliant and is optionally equipped with cable redundancy. The master will be complemented with the »Master Monitor«, which makes the configuration and inspection of the connected EtherCAT topology more comfortable.

The software of the »RealTime Suite« provides users additionally for highly precise timers and the necessary real-time network drivers as well as further mechanisms, such as hardware access to PCI cards or USB devices, serial interfaces or the connection to CAN-cards in real time. The user can program his real-time control application in the usual and well-known development environment in C/C++ or Delphi.