The Guidance Controller supports communications via two local serial ports, Ethernet, and both digital and analog signals. In addition, if one or more Remote IO Boards (RIO's) are connected to the controller, remote serial lines and digital and analog signals are available. Remote communication ports and channels are accessed in the same manner as local resources, but have a slightly longer time delay.
The serial and Ethernet ports can be access by GPL projects to implement interfaces to other devices. In addition, both of these communications means serve as part of the operator and programming interface. However, only the Ethernet interface supports the powerful development system, setup tools, and operator interface that run on a PC. In addition, the Ethernet interface is required to initially load or modify procedures written in the GPL programming language.
The digital and analog facilities of the Guidance Controller provide a simple means for implementing interfaces to external devices and sensors. Digital signals have binary values that are either on or off. Analog signals have numeric values that represent voltage levels. See the Hardware Reference section for details regarding the appropriate voltage and current values for both digital and analog inputs and outputs.