Sychene

Idebe

Idebe is a Integrated Development Environment for the OB1 PLC. Idebe provides a programmable language, an editor, a compiler, and a debugger. Its goal was to create a tool to easily develop and debug application for PLC device. The first version of Idebe as been developed in C++ and Delphi. A new version is now under development in C#.

Editor and programming language

Idebe offers a simple and high level language to program PLC. The keywords of the language are available in many country languages (English, French etc.). The editor can be set in any moment to show and edit the PLC program in one of the available country languages. A verbose or brief mode is also available. The editor drives the user to write sintactically correct programs. Here it is a source codee an example:

          Se Contatore1 > 5 allora
            Attiva Uscita4
  
          Ritardo 5000 ms

The same code translated in C-like language

        1
        program
        {
          if ( C1 > 5 ) {
            WriteOut 1 O4
          }
          Delay 5000
        }

...and then to P-Code


        0x30, 0x04, 0x2E, 0x05, 0x00, 0x00, 0x00, 0x14, 0x20, 0x0E, 0x22, 0x00, 0x2C, 0x81, 0x2E, 0x88
        0x13, 0x00, 0x00, 0x0A, 0x08, 0x34, 0x00

        Function programma
            if C1 > 5
        002200  30        PushCounter         
        002201  04        C1                  
        002202  2E        Push                
        002203  00000005  5                   
        002207  14        IsGreat             
        002208  20        JumpZero            
        002209  220E      to 526                            
              WriteOut 1 O4
        00220C  2C        OutSet              
        00220D  81        O4                  
            endif
            Delay 5000
        00220E  2E        Push                
        00220F  00001388  5000                
        002213  0A        DelayStart          
        002214  08        Delay               
        002215  34        Return              
        002216  00        0                   
        End Function

The PLC and Idebe communicate using the serial port. More specifically the serial port is used for the following task: send the PLC user program from the editor to the PLC, debug the user program, monitor the status of the PLC, upgrade the PLC operating system.

Debugging

After having edited a PLC program the user can send it to the PLC and run it. Alternatively the user can run it in step-by-step mode to check the program correctness. In this case the user can also monitor the PLC internal status (I/O, counter, memory etc.)

Relations between compiler and editor

Graphical interface

Here it is a screenshot of the graphical interface of Idebe.

Macro

A program is a set of macro executed simultaneously (thread). One of the macro name have to be Program and this is the main macro. In this screenshot you can see the main macro (Program) and two secondary ones.

Status bar

The status bar is used to send the program to the PLC or to run it, to stop it etc.

I/O status panel

This panel shows the status of the digital input and output (on/off) and the status of the analog input and output of the PLC.

Istruction selection panel

This panel list all the avaible PLC instructions.

Parameter window

The selection of an instruction open an instruction specific window and allow to set the instruction parameter.

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