Operation Manual

References
187
850-165186 / Rev.B
Interface setup
These settings are used to set up the PI54 parameters related to
the communication to and from peripheral units. To access the
parameters, press the MENU button to access the main menu.
Then, select Interface setup on the Setup menu.
Note: The parameters in the Interface setup will normally only be
accessed during system installation. If you change any of these
parameters during normal operation, your system may not be
able to communicate with external devices, and this may lead to
operational degradation.
Background
By means of the connectors on the rear side of the PI54 cabinet,
it can communicate with several peripheral devices. This is
useful, as it allows you to export and impor t information to and
from these devices. In order to establish this communication, the
devices on each end of the cable must speak the same
“language”. The National Marine Electronics Association
(NMEA) has defined communication standards f or maritime
electronic equipment, and the PI54 system conforms to these
standards. The most common standard is NMEA 0183, and the
National Marine Electronics Association describes it as follows:
“The NMEA 0183 In terface Standard defines electrical signal
requirements, data transmission protocol and time, and specific
sentence formats for a 4800-baud serial data bus. Each bus may
have only one talker but many listeners.” For more information
about the National Marine Electronics Association and the
NMEA 0183 standard, refer to the organization’s web pages at
www.nmea.org
.
Telegrams
To move information between two electronic units, the data are
collected in telegrams
. The content (protocol) of each telegram
is defined by the NMEA standard, and several telegram types
exist to allow different type of data to be distributed. Unless you
wish to write your own software, you do not need to know how
these telegrams are designed. However, whenever you set up
equipment interfaces, you need to ensure that each system on
your communication line is set up to send and receive the same
telegram. The standard allows one system to send data (a
“talker”) and several others to receive data simultanously
(”listeners”) on the same line. Therefore, you must ensure that
all pr oducts receiving data on a communication line is set up to
receive the same telegram(s) that the transmitting product
provides.