Communication Devices
Note: Individual communication device EIE configurations are often referred to in the CygNet Help as "communication devices," which reflects how they are displayed in the communication device editors in the Device Definition Service (DDS).
CygNet does not produce any of the numerous physical communication devices (modems, routers, and so forth) used in the field. Instead, CygNet develops (among other things) the software tools to allow these field devices to operate with CygNet services. The primary tool CygNet has developed for interfacing with communication devices is the equipment interface engine (EIE). EIEs are sometimes referred to as "communication devices."
The communication device EIE handles communications between a host computer and connected remote devices. Be sure to select this component when configuring a remote device EIE. Since the communication device EIE is a separate component from the remote device EIE, in most cases any communication device EIE may be paired with any remote device EIE.
Note: The OPC Comm device EIE can only be paired with the OPC remote device EIE.
EIEs are housed and accessed in the Device Definition Service (DDS), which is also the repository for field device data. While the DDS has no defined number of communication devices it supports, limitations are imposed by host hardware, operating system, memory, and other variables. For instance, due to memory limitations TCP/IP device EIEs should be limited to 1,500 per host server. Each instance of a communication device EIE is a facility, and it can be assigned additional descriptive attributes in the Facility Service (FAC).
The following topics describe the wide variety of EIE types provided to support communication devices that interface with CygNet.
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