DeviceNet* Solutions Provides communication mechanisms fulfilling a variety of needs that may be individually implemented or used all together in the same system DeviceNet* Solutions are designed to be low-cost, real-time, device-level bus architecture that connects sensors and actuators. Wiring and installation of automation devices is greatly simplified while the diagnostic information about the various I/O is enhanced. DeviceNet defines a standard device object-oriented software model that permits multi-vendor interoperability. It offers the user a variety of control architectures, giving the control designer the ability to choose either: highly distributed control, semi-distributed control or highly centralized control.
DeviceNet is a digital, multi-drop network and a producer-consumer network. The digital, multi-drop network connects and serves as a communication network between industrial controllers and I/O devices and each device and/or controller is a node on the network. As the producer-consumer network, DeviceNet supports multiple communication hierarchies and message prioritization. These systems can be configured to operate in a master-slave or a distributed control architecture using peer-to-peer communication, offering a single point of connection for configuration and control by supporting both I/O and explicit messaging. Another unique feature is having power on the network.
DeviceNet is also CAN (Controller Area Network) based communication protocol that transmits a maximum of 8-bytes as a single message. Its primary usage is with digital I/O and non time-critical analog control. DeviceNet supports on-line node insertion and removal.