Using EC-Engineer with TI C2000 Microcontrollers

Acontis partner Texas Instruments has written a wonderful and informative blog series on implementing EtherCAT on the TI C2000™ series microcontrollers titled, "Real-time control meets real-time industrial communications development." This four-part blog series covers:

  • Part 1 - An overview of the market opportunities for EtherCAT slave stack support on C2000 microcontrollers (MCUs) and an introduction to a three-phased solution to jump-start slave stack development.
  • Part 2 - A detailed look at what’s different and compelling about the TI C2000 MCU EtherCAT implementation.
  • Part 3 - A breakdown of the three phases of development for your own slave-node application using the EtherCAT slave and C2000 Delfino MCU controlCARD kit, and how the TI EtherCAT package in C2000 controlSUITE™ software supports each phase.
  • Part 4 - The steps for the development of your own EtherCAT slave controller using the latest C2000 TMS320F28388D real-time controller.

Now it is possible to evaluate and experiment with EtherCAT on the TMS320F28388 by using acontis' EtherCAT Master software via EC-Engineer. The TI EtherCAT Slave Controller User Guide has been updated, and you can follow the steps outlined in Chapter 5 for using EC-Engineer.

EC-Engineer is an easy-to-use software tool for configuring, analyzing, and monitoring EtherCAT slaves and networks. EC-Engineer comes with built-in EtherCAT Master functionality, and for development of your own EtherCAT Master on a wide variety of different operating systems and hardware architectures, be sure to check out EC-Master.