A data sharing system

Abstract

The present invention relates to the field of robot control technology, and discloses a data sharing system. In the present invention, the data sharing system is included in the control system of an industrial robot, and the data sharing system includes: a processor module, a bus communication module, and a debugging and monitoring module; wherein the processor module provides a processor for the data sharing system; the bus communication module is used to realize data communication between the industrial robot and a PLC device; wherein the PLC device is a PLC device with a different communication bus protocol from the industrial robot; the debugging and monitoring module is used to monitor and / or debug the task operation of the industrial robot. It can solve the problem that the robot controller cannot connect to an external PLC controller, and expand the scope of use of the robot controller.

Description

Technical Field

[0001] The present invention relates to the field of robot control technology, and in particular to a data sharing system. Background Art

[0002] In recent years, emerging technologies represented by the Internet, big data, and artificial intelligence have accelerated their integration with the manufacturing industry, promoting the development of intelligent manufacturing. The application of industrial robots has also covered a wider range of industries, such as automobile manufacturing, 3C electronics and electrical, rubber and plastics, food, chemicals, casting and other industries. Production is also becoming more and more intelligent, and gradually meeting the newly proposed requirements of informatization, digitization, and precision.

[0003] As the number of usage scenarios increases, existing robot controllers have also encountered some problems. In some application scenarios where the robot controller needs to communicate with other PLC devices, the controller may not support the protocol interface. For example, the soft PLC on the robot controller uses EtherCAT as the master station for communication, but the on-site use also needs to communicate with an external PLC that only supports the Profinet protocol, or needs to communicate with an external PLC that only supports the Ethernet / IP protocol. It can be seen that the scope of application of the robot controller is very limited.

[0004] Therefore, solving the problem that the robot controller cannot connect to the external PLC controller and expanding the scope of use of the robot controller have become urgent issues to be solved. Summary of the invention

[0005] The purpose of the embodiment of the present invention is to provide a data sharing system to solve the problem that the robot controller cannot be connected to an external PLC controller and expand the scope of use of the robot controller.

[0006] In order to solve the above problems, an embodiment of the present invention provides a data sharing system, which belongs to the control system of an industrial robot, and the data sharing system includes: a processor module, a bus communication module, and a debugging and monitoring module; wherein the processor module provides a processor for the data sharing system; the bus communication module is used to realize data communication between the industrial robot and the PLC device; wherein the PLC device is a PLC device with a different communication bus protocol from the industrial robot; the debugging and monitoring module is used to monitor and / or debug the task operation status of the industrial robot.

[0007] In an embodiment of the present invention, the data sharing system belongs to the control system of an industrial robot, and the data sharing system includes: a processor module, a bus communication module, and a debugging and monitoring module; wherein the processor module provides a processor for the data sharing system; the bus communication module is used to realize data communication between the industrial robot and the PLC device; wherein the PLC device is a PLC device with a different communication bus protocol from the industrial robot; the debugging and monitoring module is used to monitor and / or debug the task operation of the industrial robot. The data sharing system provided by the present application solves the problem that an automation controller based on a communication bus protocol as a master station has difficulty communicating with other PLC devices with different communication bus protocols at the industrial site, and can realize communication across multiple industrial buses. It solves the problem that the robot controller cannot connect to an external PLC controller, and expands the scope of use of the robot controller.

[0008] In some embodiments, the processor module is an embedded ARM processor.

[0009] In some embodiments, the bus communication module includes an EtherCat slave bus communication module and a conversion protocol communication module; wherein the EtherCat slave bus communication module establishes a communication connection with the master station as an EtherCat slave; and the conversion protocol communication module is used to convert the communication bus protocol of the industrial robot into the communication bus protocol corresponding to the PLC device.

[0010] In some embodiments, the conversion protocol communication module includes a first communication module and / or a second communication module.

[0011] In some embodiments, the first communication module includes: a Profinet slave station, an EtherNet / IP slave station, and a CClink Basic slave station.

[0012] In some embodiments, the second communication module includes: a CClink slave station.

[0013] In some embodiments, the second communication module is deployed in the data sharing system in the form of an expansion card.

[0014] In some embodiments, the EtherCat slave bus communication module and the conversion protocol communication module read and write the shared data area respectively. By sharing the memory, unnecessary memory movement times are saved and the delay of data transmission is reduced.

[0015] In some embodiments, the conversion protocol communication module is also used to automatically identify the communication bus protocol corresponding to the PLC device.

[0016] In some embodiments, the conversion protocol communication module is further used to determine the communication bus protocol corresponding to the PLC device based on the information received by the communication bus protocol determination interface or the signal of the mode switch. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0017] One or more embodiments are exemplarily described by pictures in the corresponding drawings, and these exemplifications do not constitute limitations on the embodiments. Elements with the same reference numerals in the drawings represent similar elements, and unless otherwise stated, the figures in the drawings do not constitute proportional limitations.

[0018] Figure 1 is a structural schematic diagram of a data sharing system provided according to at least one embodiment of the present invention;

[0019] Figure 2 is a schematic diagram of reading and writing a shared data area according to at least one embodiment of the present invention;

[0020] Figure 3 It is a schematic diagram of the operation flow of a data sharing system provided according to at least one embodiment of the present invention. DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0021] In order to make the purpose, technical scheme and advantages of the embodiments of the present invention clearer, the following will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings. However, it will be appreciated by those skilled in the art that in the various embodiments of the present invention, many technical details are provided in order to enable the reader to better understand the present application. However, even without these technical details and various changes and modifications based on the following embodiments, the technical scheme claimed in the present application can be implemented.

[0022] In addition, the terms "first" and "second" are used for descriptive purposes only and should not be understood as indicating or implying relative importance or implicitly indicating the number of the indicated technical features. Therefore, the features defined as "first" and "second" may explicitly or implicitly include at least one of the features. In the description of the present invention, the meaning of "plurality" is at least two, such as two, three, etc., unless otherwise clearly and specifically defined.

[0023] In the present invention, unless otherwise clearly specified and limited, the terms "installed", "connected", "connected", "fixed" and the like should be understood in a broad sense, for example, it can be a fixed connection, a detachable connection, or an integral connection; it can be a mechanical connection or an electrical connection; it can be a direct connection or an indirect connection through an intermediate medium, it can be the internal connection of two elements or the interaction relationship between two elements, unless otherwise clearly defined. For ordinary technicians in this field, the specific meanings of the above terms in the present invention can be understood according to specific circumstances.

[0024] In the description of this specification, the description with reference to the terms "one embodiment", "some embodiments", "example", "specific example", or "some examples" etc. means that the specific features, structures, materials or characteristics described in conjunction with the embodiment or example are included in at least one embodiment or example of the present invention. In this specification, the schematic representations of the above terms do not necessarily refer to the same embodiment or example. Moreover, the specific features, structures, materials or characteristics described may be combined in any one or more embodiments or examples in a suitable manner. In addition, those skilled in the art may combine and combine the different embodiments or examples described in this specification and the features of the different embodiments or examples, without contradiction.

[0025] One embodiment of the present invention relates to a data sharing system.

[0026] In this embodiment, the data sharing system is included in the control system of the industrial robot, and the data sharing system includes: a processor module, a bus communication module, and a debugging and monitoring module; wherein the processor module provides a processor for the data sharing system; the bus communication module is used to realize data communication between the industrial robot and the PLC device; wherein the PLC device is a PLC device with a different communication bus protocol from the industrial robot; the debugging and monitoring module is used to monitor and / or debug the task operation status of the industrial robot.

[0027] The following is a detailed description of the implementation details of the data sharing system in this embodiment. The following content is only for the convenience of understanding the implementation details of this solution, and is not necessary for the implementation of this solution. Figure 1 As shown, it may include the following components: a processor module, a bus communication module, and a debugging and monitoring module; wherein the processor module provides a processor for the data sharing system; the bus communication module is used to realize data communication between the industrial robot and the PLC device; wherein the PLC device is a PLC device with a different communication bus protocol from the industrial robot; the debugging and monitoring module is used to monitor and / or debug the task operation status of the industrial robot.

[0028] In some embodiments, the processor module included in the data sharing system provided in this embodiment can be an embedded ARM processor. In this embodiment, since the data sharing system belongs to a system running special function software, a low-power, low-cost embedded ARM processor can be selected. In addition, the operating system can select an open source real-time operating system, which has an excellent multi-task scheduling algorithm. While meeting the real-time requirements, it also integrates a TCP / IP protocol stack, which is convenient for direct communication on Ethernet.

[0029] It is worth noting that in industrial sites, the EtherCat communication bus is generally used as the default communication master in the robot control system. In this embodiment, the bus communication module is used for the EtherCat bus to exchange data with other buses, and complete the data communication between the robot and other PLC devices. In some embodiments, the bus communication module may include an EtherCat slave bus communication module and a conversion protocol communication module; wherein the EtherCat slave bus communication module establishes a communication connection with the master station as an EtherCat slave; and the conversion protocol communication module is used to convert the communication bus protocol of the industrial robot into the communication bus protocol corresponding to the PLC device.

[0030] In the data sharing system provided in this embodiment, in order to realize the cross-EtherCat data sharing function, the EtherCat communication bus itself needs to be used as a slave station to establish a communication connection with the master station. The EtherCat slave station uses a dedicated slave station hardware module to implement the parsing and sending of protocol packets, and is combined with the slave station software running on it to meet the high real-time performance of the communication bus protocol.

[0031] In some embodiments, the conversion protocol communication module may include a first communication module and / or a second communication module, wherein the first communication module may be referred to as a general communication module and the second communication module may be referred to as a dedicated communication module.

[0032] In some embodiments, the universal communication module may include multiple types such as Profinet slave, EtherNet / IP slave, CClink Basic slave, etc. These slaves communicate with various dedicated external PLCs in actual scenarios. The three communication interfaces listed above are implemented by the universal communication module, namely the Ethernet communication interface, in combination with the software communication slave.

[0033] For a network running multiple communication protocols, for example, the entire network of an external switch has a master station communicating via the Profinet protocol and a master station communicating via the Ethernet / IP protocol, the protocol conversion communication module can be set to manually select the communication protocol mode. In some embodiments, the data sharing system can provide a communication bus protocol selection page for technicians to determine which communication bus protocol the PLC device communicating with the industrial robot belongs to. In other words, in some embodiments, the protocol conversion communication module is also used to determine the communication bus protocol corresponding to the PLC device based on the information received by the communication bus protocol determination interface.

[0034] In other embodiments, for a network running a single communication protocol, the default intelligent mode can also be used, that is, the software determines and automatically identifies the running communication protocol. In other words, in some embodiments, the conversion protocol communication module is also used to automatically identify the communication bus protocol corresponding to the PLC device. On the universal communication module, multiple communication bus protocols can be switched to run, which can not only reduce production costs, but also break the use restrictions of the data sharing system provided by this embodiment and expand the scope of use of this data sharing system.

[0035] In addition, the dedicated communication module refers to a communication module such as CClink that requires specific slave hardware. In some embodiments, the dedicated communication module can be used in the form of an expansion card, which saves the implementation cost of the shared data system and is also conducive to interface reuse.

[0036] The software related to the protocol conversion communication module is the key to the performance of the entire data sharing system. In addition to multiple protocol slave codes, the software also includes a protocol type judgment module. The protocol type judgment module mentioned here determines the type of protocol that needs to be converted through external hardware signals or intelligent protocol type judgment methods. The protocol can be manually selected by providing a hardware signal through the mode switch. The intelligent protocol judgment method is to capture the protocol type of the physical protocol frame data and let the software intelligently judge the type of communication bus protocol.

[0037] As a multi-industrial bus adapter system, in addition to manually selecting and setting the access bus type, it adds automatic identification technology for industrial bus adaptation, intelligently identifies the bus protocol type of the external PLC for data conversion. It adds online debugging function, allowing access to an external debugging host, viewing the status of the adapter through the debugging interface, and performing configuration operations on it.

[0038] In some embodiments, the conversion protocol stack corresponding to the conversion protocol communication module and the EtherCat protocol stack corresponding to the EtherCat slave bus communication module read and write the shared data area respectively, which can realize fast data protocol conversion. In the whole system, the hardware provides multiple interfaces, and the software finally determines the one-to-one data protocol conversion to realize the function of this system. The schematic diagram of the EtherCat slave task executed by the EtherCat slave bus communication module and the protocol stack task to be converted executed by the conversion protocol communication module reading and writing the shared data area is shown in FIG. Figure 2 In the above embodiment, by sharing memory, unnecessary memory movement times are saved, and the delay is reduced; the single-flow design of the shared data area complies with the concurrent read and write mechanism, and further improves the read and write efficiency.

[0039] In addition, the data sharing system provided in this embodiment supports a local debugging interface, through which developers can view the task running status and the data change status of the shared memory area, thus facilitating software development and operation maintenance.

[0040] After the data sharing system provided in this embodiment is constructed, the flow chart of the operation of the data sharing system can be as follows: Figure 3 As shown. Figure 3 , first initialize the preset shared memory area so that both the EtherCat slave bus communication module and the conversion protocol communication module can read and write to the shared memory area; further, start the EtherCat slave task to run, and then read the signal transmitted by the hardware switch, and judge whether the communication protocol that the conversion protocol communication module needs to convert to can be known according to the signal, or whether further intelligent judgment is still needed for the communication protocol that needs to be converted. If necessary, bind the universal interface to detect the communication bus protocol corresponding to the PLC device of the industrial robot communication, and start the conversion protocol communication module to convert to the communication bus protocol after detection. Finally, when it is determined that it can be ended, the operation process of this data sharing system is ended, and the communication connection of the industrial robot across the communication bus protocol is realized.

[0041] In one example, in order to verify the data sharing system provided by this embodiment, a Renesas RZ / N2L gateway chip is selected as the main chip of this data sharing system, and an ARM chip supporting 4GB addressing is also provided. -R52 processor, provides EtherCat slave module, Ethernet interface, and on-board expansion port to add CC-link hardware module. The FreeRTOS operating system runs on the board, and the protocol conversion software runs on it. In this case, the communication bus protocol to be converted can be determined by the DIP switch, or the intelligent mode can be used for the software system to automatically identify and determine which communication bus protocol mode to convert to. Dual-stack running tasks communicate data through the established shared memory. The running status of each task can be monitored through the debug serial port to obtain data exchange status.

[0042] The data communication delay of PLC is generally required to be within 30us. The soft PLC codesys environment on the robot uses EtherCat as the default communication bus. It acts as the master station, and the external PLC communicates through an external switch. PLC only supports Profinet communication protocol. The operation mode is selected through the DIP switch and the machine is powered on. The PLC controller maps the data sharing system to a Profinet slave station through the GSDL file, establishes a read and write channel, and sets the read and write cycle to 1us. The robot side maps the data sharing system to an EtherCat slave station through an xml device description file, establishes DI and DO, and sets the task cycle to 4us. The debugging host is connected to the shared file system through the RS232 serial port, and data changes can be monitored by viewing the software output information. Assign values ​​in the write channel on the PLC side, and the data will be immediately transmitted to the DI of the EtherCat master station. Through Ethernet, the debugging host writes data in the DO area, and we can obtain the data on the master station side of the PLC.

[0043] The above example verifies the data sharing system provided by this embodiment through a program ping-pong test. The test shows that the round-trip delay of 128-byte data transmission on the PLC side is within 12us, and the one-way transmission delay is within 6us. Therefore, it can be concluded that data transmission based on the data sharing system provided by this embodiment can achieve complete and effective cross-bus transmission, which is sufficient to meet the delay requirements of most industrial robot application scenarios.

[0044] In an embodiment of the present invention, the data sharing system is included in the control system of the industrial robot, and the data sharing system includes: a processor module, a bus communication module, and a debugging and monitoring module; wherein the processor module provides a processor for the data sharing system; the bus communication module is used to realize data communication between the industrial robot and the PLC device; wherein the PLC device is a PLC device with a different communication bus protocol from the industrial robot; the debugging and monitoring module is used to monitor and / or debug the task operation of the industrial robot. The data sharing system provided by the present application solves the problem that the automation controller based on a certain communication bus protocol as the master station has difficulty communicating with other PLC devices with different communication bus protocols at the industrial site, and can realize communication across multiple industrial buses. It solves the problem that the robot controller cannot connect to the external PLC controller, and expands the scope of use of the robot controller.

[0045] The beneficial effects achieved by this application are mainly as follows:

[0046] 1. It breaks the communication barrier between devices with different communication bus protocols and realizes the communication between the robot controller and PLC devices with different communication bus protocols.

[0047] 2. It can meet the real-time requirements of PLC communication within 20us in general application scenarios of industrial robots.

[0048] 3. Ability to flexibly determine the transmission protocol type of PLC equipment through manual selection or automatic identification technology.

[0049] It is worth mentioning that the modules involved in the above-mentioned embodiments of the present invention are all logic modules. In practical applications, a logic unit can be a physical unit, a part of a physical unit, or a combination of multiple physical units. In addition, in order to highlight the innovative part of the present invention, the present embodiment does not introduce units that are not closely related to solving the technical problems proposed by the present invention, but this does not mean that there are no other units in the present embodiment.

[0050] The above embodiments are provided to those of ordinary skill in the art to implement and use the present invention. Those of ordinary skill in the art can make various modifications or changes to the above embodiments without departing from the inventive concept of the present application. Therefore, the protection scope of the present invention is not limited to the above embodiments, but should conform to the maximum scope of the innovative features mentioned in the claims.

Claims

1. A data sharing system, characterized in that: Included in the control system of the industrial robot, the data sharing system includes: a processor module, a bus communication module, and a debugging and monitoring module; Wherein, the processor module provides a processor for the data sharing system; The bus communication module is used to realize data communication between the industrial robot and the PLC device; wherein the PLC device is a PLC device with a different communication bus protocol from that of the industrial robot; The debugging and monitoring module is used to monitor and / or debug the task operation status of the industrial robot; The bus communication module includes an EtherCat slave bus communication module and a conversion protocol communication module. The EtherCat slave bus communication module establishes a communication connection with the master station as an EtherCat slave station. The conversion protocol communication module is used to convert the communication bus protocol of the industrial robot into the communication bus protocol corresponding to the PLC device. The conversion protocol communication module includes a first communication module and / or a second communication module, wherein the first communication module is a universal communication module for switching and running a plurality of communication bus protocols, and the second communication module is a dedicated communication module, which is deployed in the data sharing system in the form of an expansion card; The EtherCat slave bus communication module and the conversion protocol communication module read and write the shared data area respectively; The shared data area realizes bidirectional data transmission through two independent unidirectional channels; The conversion protocol communication module is also used to automatically identify the communication bus protocol corresponding to the PLC device; The conversion protocol communication module is also used to determine the communication bus protocol corresponding to the PLC device according to the information received by the communication bus protocol determination interface or the signal of the mode switch.

2. The data sharing system according to claim 1, characterized in that: The processor module is an embedded ARM processor.

3. The data sharing system according to claim 1, characterized in that: The first communication module includes: Profinet slave station, EtherNet / IP slave station, and CClink Basic slave station.

4. The data sharing system according to claim 1, characterized in that: The second communication module includes: a CClink slave station.

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