Motivation
I used a ESU ECoS 50210 and several LDT's S88 feedback devices. After a while the ECoS' feedback device does not recognizes any input anymore, the LDT's still worked after adding an HSI-88-N. But then I realized that Rocrail does not support the HSI-88-USB, only the old fashioned HSI-88 with serial connection (no USB!).
My used hardware & software:
RM-88-N, 16-fold Standard-Feedback Module, https://www.ldt-infocenter.com/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=de:rm-88-nHSI-88-USB, High Speed Interface for the s88-Feedbackbus!, https://www.ldt-infocenter.com/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=de:hsi-88-usbESU ECoS 50210, https://www.esu.eu/en/products/digital-control/ecos-50210-dcc-system/what-ecos-can-do/- so far I used:
Rocrail, https://wiki.rocrail.net/doku.php?id=start
Idea
The communication protocol between the ECoS and the outside world is plaintext-based. It looks like this:
get(1, info)
get(1, status)
<REPLY get(1, info)>
1 ECoS2
1 ProtocolVersion[0.5]
1 ApplicationVersion[4.2.13]
1 HardwareVersion[2.1]
<END 0 (OK)>
<REPLY get(1, status)>
1 status[STOP]
<END 0 (OK)>
queryObjects(26,ports)
<REPLY queryObjects(26,ports)>
100 ports[16]
101 ports[16]
102 ports[16]
103 ports[16]
<END 0 (OK)>
get(100, state)
get(101, state)
get(102, state)
get(103, state)
<REPLY get(100, state)>
100 state[0x0]
<END 0 (OK)>
<REPLY get(101, state)>
101 state[0x0]
<END 0 (OK)>
<REPLY get(102, state)>
102 state[0x0]
<END 0 (OK)>
<REPLY get(103, state)>
103 state[0x0]
<END 0 (OK)>Just connect with telnet (i.e. $ telnet 192.168.178.119 15471) or an other terminal network tool and enter the mentioned commands.
EsuEcosMiddleman (so-called ManInTheMiddle (MITM)) is started locally, starts a local server to which Rocrail connects like normal. MITM splits the commands into two channels:
a) one for the S88 data
b) the second for all other data
It will work like a normal connection, as it would established when used directly. But the S88-data is fetched from the HSI-88-USB device and weaved into the data stream.
The following figure provides a bird-view of the architecture.
In addition, an extra channel as WebSocket connection is added to allow any renderer to access the current feedback state. Open Renderer/renderer.html in the browser of your choice to view the web-based S88-renderer.
Environment
Tested and build for Windows environments only.
Release
When any change is pushed the daily build will provide a new portable Release.
Just unzip and run the executable.
Testbed
Byte Order
To research the byte order structure I installed a single LDT RM-88-N-Opto and verified the received data. The setup commands are:
> t1 (send)
< t1
> s010000 (send, one feedback device a string "left")
< s01
< i01010000
> v
< V. 1.08 / HSI-88-USB / 1.05r Win 10 (64) / (c) 2011 LDT & Flakner
> m
< m01010000After the setup just connect a wire from the railroad (mass, brown/black) to the input pins of the feedback device.
Result:
PIN Data from HSI-88-USB
01 i01010001
02 i01010002
03 i01010004
04 i01010008
05 i01010010
06 i01010020
07 i01010040
08 i01010080
09 i01010100
10 i01010200
11 i01010400
12 i01010800
13 i01011000
14 i01012000
15 i01014000
16 i01018000Setup
The runtime can be configured by Json-based configuration file named EsuEcosMiddleman.json, it lays side-by-side to the executable within the build directory, e.g. bin\Release\EsuEcosMiddleman.exe.
hsi/devicePathis required to address you attachedHSI-88-USBdeviceecos/ipis the ip address of your ECoS
Debouncing
It has been shown that the HSI-88-USB detects any change, as well very small triggers. Sometimes very often when trains crosses a single detection area. This can slow down any railway control software because of status/command flooding and when several logging mechanism are switched on (e.g. log4net with INFO or DEBUG level).
To reduce this a debouncing functionality can help. When any approach exist in the hardware directly, just it, because it will be much faster and reliable. In any other cases you can configure global debouncing walltime in EsuEcosMiddleware.json.
The values are milliseconds, only real pin state changes after this walltime are handled and provided to connected clients.
{
...
"debounce": {
"onMs": 20,
"offMs": 2000
},
...
}Command Filtering
During tests it has been shown that Rocrail handles few commands which are not really supported by the ECoS, e.g. Devicemanager (id=20) (see Netzwerkspezifikation für das PC-Interface, Version 0.2, Juni 2011).
To minimize the dust for ECoS a filtering for commands has been implemented. Below filter (see configuration file EsuEcosMiddleware.json) object ids and object id ranges can be defined. The range is important because several commands with object ids targeting objects over 50000000 are addressed by Rocrail which do not really exist. The filtering supports the following math equations:
/*
* >= greater or equal
* <= less or equal
* == equal
* < less
* > greater
*/
if (c0 == '>' && c1 == '=') return objId >= GetMathPartner(equT, 2);
if (c0 == '<' && c1 == '=') return objId <= GetMathPartner(equT, 2);
if (c0 == '=' && c1 == '=') return objId == GetMathPartner(equT, 2);
if (c0 == '<' ) return objId < GetMathPartner(equT, 1);
if (c0 == '>' ) return objId > GetMathPartner(equT, 1);Runtime / Demonstration
The following screenshots show the software in action for a real model railway.
WebUi Renderer
In addition, this software provides a web based renderer to give you direct information which feedback pins are active or not. On startup a WebSocket server is started on port ecos.port (see configuration file EsuEcosMiddleware.json), sometimes it can be required to start the application as Administrator. When started open Renderer\renderer.html in your favorite browser and the result should look like the following screenshot.
The view is split into three areas which are the representation of the HSI-88-USB channels, i.e. left, middle, and right.
