Protocol options

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• LinkConfirmMode - Protocol mode in which in the link layer all requests receive confirmation response from their receipt. By default this field is "Enabled".

• Accept Unsolicited DNP - Marking this option as "Enabled", causes the master station to send to the slave station, an Enable Unsolicited Messages message (Function Code = 20), when starting channel execution, right after the Class 0 request, and each time the master receives "RESTART" indication in the Internal Indications field.

• MasterStationID - Number between 1 and 65534, univocal and corresponds to the address of the master station. Thus, a master when he sends a message to a slave tells his address. Some slaves respond to the master disregarding this number, others require that the address declared in the slave be the same as the master's. By default this field is "65534".

• Quality changes timestamp - Marking this option as "Enabled", causes a re-read means that when a new reading of an object is received, with flag, even if there is no change in the status (or value) of the tag, but there is a change in the quality, a change is made of the tag's current timestamp of the tag is made.

• Logging Level - You can choose from this list the way the log works created by the communication module.

• IED time bias from GMT - However Action.NET, internally, all timestamps are stored with dates in GMT (UTC). Normally Ieds send these dates also in GMT, and no correction is made. The Default for this option is Zero. If in the current deployment the IEDs send the timestamps in their local time, you must specify here the difference between this time and GMT time. For example in Brasilia the local time is 3 hours less than GMT. For this case should be specified -3 in this table.

• Password for commands: To increase security when sending commands, typically initiated only by a change in the state of a tag, you can specify here a password of up to 9 digits, which will be checked by the communication module against the current value, at the time of receipt of the command, with the attribute EstimatedValue of the tag involved in the command. So in the command send operation by a window, script, etc. this number should be loaded into this attribute. The communication module, after executing the command, passes to ZERO the value of Estimatedvalue. Leaving this option with zero, the check will not be done.

• SYNCHRONIZATION LAN - Indicates the synchronization method to be used by the driver, according to the IED with which it communicates. Choice NONE not to sync, LAN to use the LAN Sync method and Nolan to use the Non Lan method.

  • LAN Procedure consists of sending two separate request messages: Record Current Time , and a message Write. The first prompts the external station to record the receiving time of the last octet in the message, and the second sends the time when the message should have reached the external station.

  • Non LAN Procedure consists of sending two separate request messages: Delay Measurement and a message Write. The first one assses the seed delay in the physical layer of the protocol, and the second sends the time that is expected to be when the message arrives at the secondary station.

• Timeout(ms) -Wait time in milliseconds for receiving a response after sending any request. It is a functional check, which does not take into account the type of request or response, only checks for responses being received on the channel.

• Level Dnp30 - By default is used the profile of Level 3 ( Level 3). If you want the operation as at level 2, you can indicate number 2 here. The client will not use objects and functions available at level 3, such as dynamic enablement and disabling of Unsolicited and requests from multiple classes in the same message.

• Tls Enable - Only in case of TCPIP communication mode,, cryptographic security usage can optionally be defined in communication, based on the TLS - Transport Layer Security standard. In this case both Client and server should use this option Enabled and fill in the next three options with the names of text files containing keys and certificates to be used in communication. These files should be placed in the subdirectory where this project is located.

  • Tls Own Key - File name with own key

  • Tls Own Certificate - File name with the server's own local certificate.

  • TLS CA Certificate - File name with certificate for chain validation

Settings

Serial and MultiSerial Channels:
With: Communication port of the computer used;
Baudrate
DataBits: 8
StopBits: 1 or 2
Parity: None, Even, Odd;
DTR: on, off
RTS: on,off
CTS: on, off;
Port settings must be compatible with those of the slave IED.
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Figure 2 - Serial Channel Settings

TCP/IP channels:

• ShareNodeSameIP: Accepts IED ́s with the same IP.

• Preferably leave the settings used by deafult.

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• Maximum Changes per minute - This parameter is part of the real-time verification functionality of many changes suffered by digital input points. Here you can inform the maximum number of alterations of a BI or DI point, which is considered reasonable before blocking the point or node to which it belongs. The functionality is defined at the Channel level but applies to all Nodes in the channel. Setting it to ZERO disables the functionality, other values will be used as the maximum acceptable variations per minute. See the next item to define what will be done if the maximum is reached.

• Unactivate Node if Tag maximum changes - If YES is chosen, when at least one point reaches the maximum number of changes, the entire Node will be Inactivated. This is will stop communicating with Action.NET. If NO is chosen, only the point that has exceeded the number of changes will have its Locked attribute equal to 1, and will no longer suffer any changes until an operator manually changes this attribute to Zero. In any of these cases, a message in the Operation summary will be generated to inform of what happened.

• Time to reactivate node (minutes) - Time in minutes that can be specified for the communication module to activate the Node again, after being deactivated. Zero indicates that there is no automatic reactivation.

• Time to swap stations in fail (ms) - If this parameter is left at ZERO, attempts to swap active stations (Primary and Backup) will occur within the period of time defined in the Timeout parameter, mentioned above. If a non-zero number is defined here, this will be the time period to be used when there is communication failure between attempts to exchange the primary and backup active stations. This way you can have different times for timeouts due to non-activity on the channel and changing active stations in case of failure.

Settings

For TCP/IP mode (CustomTCPIP)

No configuration is required in this field.

For Serial Communication mode (CustomSerial)

A window is used to configure the serial communication port.

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Timeout

Sets timeouts for the transmission and receipt of messages characters and the number of retries.
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Figure 4 - Timeout Attributes

In fact, in this protocol only the following timeout parameters are used:

Tx, RxFinish and Unsolicited - Not used

RxStart - This parameter is used to define the maximum response time, in milliseconds, to any message sent by the driver. That is, whenever a message is sent for which the driver expects a response or confirmation. If the response is not received within this time, it is considered a communication failure error.

NextByte - This parameter is used as the time, in milliseconds, for the first automatic reconnection attempt when there is a loss of connection in Tcp-Ip communication.

Retry - Number of attempts to resend a message without a response, or to reconnect after loss of connection. before being considered a failure, for which an attempt will be made to switch from one station to the other, in case there is a main and a backup. If ZERO is used, there will be no new attempts and the failure will be considered only once.​

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Initial State

Sets how the channel will start: enabled or Disabled. If the channel is disabled, no messages will be sent or received through it, i.e. the channel will be inactive.

Figure 5 - Initial State of the Channel