Comtrol Offers Serial Connectivity over the Internet

By Michael Foley
iApplianceWeb
(06/21/01, 09:16:31 AM EDT)

Comtrol Corporation is connecting serial devices to the Internet and providing a platform for developers to design applications to bridge serial systems to the Internet with its new DeviceMaster Real-Time Server (RTS). The system includes server features to remotely manage, monitor, and control devices with standard Internet protocols.

The system is based on a 44MHz ARM7 processor running Red Hat's eCos embedded operating system. It comes with 4MB of flash for nonvolatile storage and 8MB of RAM. Network connectivity is through a 10/100Base-T Ethernet port.

Product highlights include:

• Configurations to network-enable from 1 to 32 serial devices per DeviceMaster unit.
• 10/100Base-T network connectivity with built-in Ethernet switch.
• Application software compatibility with COM/TTY ports and TCP socket connections.
• Embedded Web server, SMTP e-mail client, and SNMP agent.
• Programmable processing platform with on-board flash and RAM memory.
• Watchdog software and reset circuitry.
• Internet accessibility and remote management capabilities.

Remote system management features provide the ability to monitor port/device performance, run diagnostics, reset ports, or even download and reinstall any or all of the DeviceMaster's software from any standard Web browser. Management and diagnostics can also be performed through TCP/IP telnet sessions using Comtrol's SocketServer software. Development tools include Comtrol's DeviceMaster developer kit and GNU tools from Red Hat, Inc. Custom Web pages can be loaded and the Web server supports Java applet serving capabilities.

The new DeviceMaster Real-Time Server (RTS) is shipping immediately. Additional DeviceMaster models will be announced in the coming months.