SANY Sensors Anywhere

The SensorSA ‘Smart Sensor Adapter (SSA)’ is a simple device which allows the user to connect a simple RS-232-based measuring device with automatic identification and registration to the station computer.

The SensorSA SSA has a possibility to provide all information required for automatic configuring of a SensorSA DAS, including e.g. capabilities of the sensor, resolution, accuracy and type of the measurements (units), sensor location, owner, proposals for information processing and more.

When attached to an USB port, the SSA allows the DAS to download its configuration data. In a next step, the DAS uses this information in the similar way it would use the configuration data obtained from the ‘sensor types’ database. Finally, the SSA switches to the ‘transparent’ mode and allows direct communication between the SensorSA DAS and the SSA RS-232 interface.

The current implementation of the SSA is based on a Microchip evaluation board shown above and the firmware supports following operations:

• setTransparent=0 or 1switch to Command mode or RS232-USB
  converter mode

• getCapabilities outputs the Sensor-ML file to USB
  
• getTemperature outputs the local temperature of the adapter (demo-value)
  
• getSwitchStates outputs the logical states of two digital input lines
  
• getPoti outputs the value of the on-board potentiometer (demo-value)

These commands can be sent over the USB connection and will be interpreted by the board until it enters the transparent mode (setTransparent=1 command). Once in transparent mode, the SSA acts as a simple USB to RS-232 bridge, which allows re-using of the existing sensor drivers with no or minimal changes.