Real I/O on a Virtual Controller

[ennieororle]

#853 Responder |

If it’s possible for teaching sake: What’s the cheapest and easiest way to hook a real I/O unit to a computer and use the real I/O on a virtual controller?

Suggestions?

[roboticanna]

#1057 Responder |

hmm you could use a small development board, with ethernet. then have it transmit a signal to the robot. Then you could use a alias signal, that you sets equal to the ethernet data.

[ennieororle]

#1058 Responder |

hanks for the reply.

Ethernet IO sounds good — does the virtual controller have access to this IO via the computer’s network?

Let me change the question slightly: Is there any way (does not need to be cheap, but let’s say under $5,000) to connect an IO module for prototyping to the virtual controller?

[roboticanna]

#1059 Responder |

A cheap board like raspberry pi, should do the trick.
I have not tried a setup like this, but I know, that you can use ethernet on a virtual controller. Then you will need to use some clever programming, to make it work like an IO signal.
I might be able to help with the program, but I don’t have a lot of spare time though.

[kaneza]

#1061 Responder |

One idea could be to write a smart component that communicates with the real io card connected to the pc. I have used Advantech (booth ISA and USB cards) a lot. But you should be able to find others as well

[ennieororle]

#1062 Responder |

Interesting — how do you configure the USB IO card in the EIO file?

[kaneza]

#1063 Responder |

Usally a IO card like this comes with an API so that you can communicate with it using for ex. C# so you can write a smart component that handles the communication with the io card. Then you have to connect the IO’s between the smart component and the virtual controller io’s.

So there is no direct connection between the EIO.cfg and the USB io card.

[ennieororle]

#1060 Responder |

Again, thanks for the replies.

graafderk,
Connecting to a PLC: I can see where it would be handy to connect to a PLC, but I’d like to connect a less intelligent I/O module.
SmartComponent: Very interesting post on the “OPC fairytale.” Mocking real I/O virtually is a great feature, but I’ve never seen them talk about RS triggering a real output, etc.
svoldgaard,
Pi: As much as I’d love an excuse to buy a Raspberry Pi, it doesn’t seem like that would translate very well into a real world application.
Help: I appreciate your offer.

http://numato.com/16-channel-e…..odule.html

I have no idea the specs to look for in an I/O module to do this — think the above could connect to the PC’s network and be configured in the EIO file of a virtual controller? Thoughts?

[Autor]

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