Master-Slave Counter Synchronization Using Transmission Count Feedback
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing control systems in factory automation struggle with accurately determining the synchronization accuracy of communication slaves, leading to uncertainties in control timing and performance, as they rely on a large number of information exchanges and lack direct feedback on each slave's synchronization status.
Innovation Solution
A control system where a communication master repeatedly transmits synchronization information to communication slaves, allowing them to update their counters based on received data and manage synchronization accuracy by tracking the number of transmissions, enabling estimation and management of synchronization accuracy for each slave.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If a large number of information exchanges are performed to establish synchronization with predetermined accuracy, then synchronization accuracy is improved, but the time required for synchronization establishment increases
Solution Approach 1:
The communication master transmits the counter value to communication slaves, and each slave feeds back its own counter value to the master. The master then calculates synchronization accuracy based on these feedback values, enabling accurate synchronization assessment without requiring excessive information exchanges.
Solution Approach 2:
Each communication slave independently manages its own counter and autonomously transmits its counter value to the master when requested. This self-service mechanism reduces the need for complex master-controlled synchronization protocols, thereby reducing synchronization establishment time while maintaining accuracy.
2Measurement precision
If the communication master transmits a large number of pieces of information to establish synchronization, then synchronization accuracy is improved, but the communication load and complexity increase
Solution Approach 1:
The invention extracts only the essential synchronization information (counter values) from the communication process. Instead of transmitting large amounts of diagnostic and status data, the system focuses exclusively on exchanging counter values between master and slaves, simplifying the communication protocol while maintaining synchronization accuracy.
Solution Approach 2:
Instead of the master calculating synchronization accuracy by analyzing multiple transmitted parameters from slaves, the invention inverts the approach: slaves transmit their counter values, and the master calculates accuracy by comparing these values against its own counter. This inversion simplifies the master's processing burden and reduces communication complexity.
3Ease of operation
If the communication master does not track the number of transmissions, then communication processing is simplified, but synchronization accuracy estimation becomes impossible
Solution Approach 1:
The communication master preliminarily sets a predetermined number of transmissions before the synchronization process begins. This preliminary action allows the master to automatically terminate the synchronization process when the predetermined count is reached, simplifying communication processing while ensuring sufficient synchronization accuracy is achieved through the planned number of counter value exchanges.
Data Source
AI summary
The communication master repeats transmission of first information indicating a counter value of a synchronization counter of the communication master to the one or more communication slaves through a network. Each of the one or more communication slaves updates the counter value of the synchronization counter of each of the one or more communication slaves based on the received first information upon receiving the first information from the communication master. The communication master manages a total number of pieces of the first information transmitted for each of the one or more communication slaves, and estimates synchronization accuracy with respect to the communication master for each communication slave based on a number of transmissions of the first information for each communication slave.