28/2/2014

Ladder Logic for PIC and AVR

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Ladder Logic for PIC and AVR

(also in: Italiano, Deutsch, Portugus, )
Quick summary: I wrote a compiler that starts with a ladder diagram and generates native
PIC16 or AVR code. Features include:
digital inputs and outputs
timers (TON, TOF, RTO)
counters (CTU, CTD, `circular counters' for use like a sequencer)
analog inputs, analog (PWM) outputs
integer variables and arithmetic instructions
easy-to-use serial communications, to a PC, LCD, or other device
shift registers, look-up tables
EEPROM variables, whose values are not forgotten when you lose power
simulator, to test your program before you generate PIC/AVR code
This program is free software; source code and executables are available for download.

Introduction
PLCs are often programmed in ladder logic. This is because PLCs originally replaced relay
control systems, and forty years later, we still haven't quite let go. A PLC, like any
microprocessor, executes a list of instructions in sequence. Ladder logic tools abstract this;
you can program the PLC by wiring up relay contacts and coils on-screen, and the PLC
runtime will simulate the circuit that you've drawn. Some of the relay contacts can be tied to
input signals from the real world; some of the coils can be tied to outputs. That way you
can make your simulated circuit interact with other devices, and actually control things. That
is the point.
Actually it's more general than that, because you can incorporate timers and counters and
arithmetic operations that you couldn't (easily) perform with just relays. The circuit concept
is still useful though, partly just because it's intuitive, but also because it abstracts the
concurrency issues. It looks like this:
||
Xa
Xb
Yout
||
1 ||-------] [------+-------] [------+-------( )-------||
||
|
|
||
||
|
Xc
|
||
||
+-------]/[------+
||

This is a simple piece of combinational logic. There are three input terms, Xa, Xb, and Xc.
There is one output term, Yout. The expression is Yout := Xa and (Xb or (not Xc)). This
makes sense if you think of Xa and Xb as normally open relay contacts, Xc as normally
closed relay contacts, and Yout as a relay coil. Of course it gets more complicated than
that:
||
||
||
Asetpoint
||
1 ||-------------------------------------{READ ADC}----||
||
||
||
Atemperature ||
||-------------------------------------{READ ADC}----||
||
||
||
||
||
||
||
||
||
{SUB min_temp :=}
||
2 ||------------------------{ Asetpoint - 20 }--------||
||
||
||
{ADD max_temp :=}
||
||------------------------{ Asetpoint + 20 }--------||
||
||
||
||
||
||
||
||
||[Atemperature >]
Yheater
||
3 ||[ max_temp
]+------------------------(R)-------||
||
|
||

http://cq.cx/ladder.pl

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||
|
||
||
Xenable
|
||
||-------]/[------+
||
||
||
||[Atemperature <]
Xenable
Yheater
||
||[ min_temp
]--------] [--------------(S)-------||
||
||
||
||
||
||
||
||
||
{SUB check_temp :=}
||
4 ||-----------------------{ Asetpoint - 30
}-------||
||
||
||
||
||
||
||
||
||[Atemperature >]
Yis_hot
||
5 ||[ check_temp ]-------------------------( )-------||
||
||
||
||
||
||
||------[END]----------------------------------------||
||
||
||
||

This is for a simple thermostat. There are two analog inputs; one of them is for the setpoint,
so that it might, for example, be connected to a pot that the user turns to select the desired
temperature. The other provides the temperature measurement; it might be a
semiconductor temperature sensor, or a platinum RTD with suitable interfacing circuitry.
There is a digital output, Yheater. That might control a heating element, through a suitable
switch (a TRIAC, or a relay, or a solid-state relay, or whatever).
We close the loop with a simple hysteretic (bang-bang) controller. We have selected plus or
minus 20 ADC units of hysteresis. That means that when the temperature falls below
(setpoint - 20), we turn on the heater, and when it climbs above (setpoint + 20), we turn
the heater off.
I chose to add a few small frills. First, there is an enable input: the heater is forced off when
Xenable is low. I also added an indicator light, Yis_hot, to indicate that the temperature is
within regulation. This compares against a threshold slightly colder than (setpoint - 20), so
that the light does not flicker with the normal cycling of the thermostat.
This is a trivial example, but it should be clear that the language is quite expressive. Ladder
logic is not a general-purpose programming language, but it is Turing-complete, accepted in
industry, and, for a limited class of (mostly control-oriented) problems, surprisingly
convenient.

A Ladder Logic Compiler for PIC16 and AVR

Modern sub-3.00 USD microcontrollers probably have about the computing power of a PLC
circa 1975. They therefore provide more than enough MIPS to run reasonably complex
ladder logic with a cycle time of a few milliseconds. I think PLCs usually have some sort of
runtime that's kind of like an interpreter or a virtual machine, but if we're doing simple logic
on a processor without much memory then a compiler might be a better idea.
So I wrote a compiler. You start with an empty rung. You can add contacts (inputs) and
coils (outputs) and more complicated structures to build up your program. Timers (TON,
TOF, RTO) are supported. The max/min durations depend on the cycle time of the `PLC,'
which is configurable; timers can count from milliseconds to tens of minutes. There are
counters and arithmetic operations (plus, minus, times, div).
Circuit elements may be added in series or in parallel with existing elements. An I/O list is
built from the ladder logic drawn. You can have internal relays (Rfoo), for which memory is
automatically allocated, or inputs (Xfoo) and outputs (Yfoo), to which you must assign a pin
on the microcontroller. The selection of pins available depends on the microcontroller. I have
tried to support the most popular PICs and AVRs (see below).
You can edit the program in graphical form:

http://cq.cx/ladder.pl

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Then you can test the program by simulating it in real time. The program appears on screen
with the energized (true) branches highlighted, which makes it easy to debug. The state of
all variables is shown at the bottom of the screen in the I/O list.

http://cq.cx/ladder.pl

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Once the program works in simulation you can assign pins to the inputs and outputs and
generate PIC or AVR code. The code generator isn't all that difficult. If you realize that a
parallel circuit is an OR and a series circuit is an AND, it's a second-year CS assignment, and
not a very long one. The editor is actually much more challenging. It would take some work
to make a smart compiler, though. For the AVR a good register allocator would provide a
major speedup. If you wanted to get very fancy then you could apply standard logic
reduction algorithms, and maybe state reduction too. That would be much more difficult.
The timers screw things up anyways.
Even ignoring all that, my code generator for the AVR is very poor. The AVR back end still
generates PIC code...for example, it does not really take advantage of the fact that the AVR
has more than one register. Some of the code that it generates is just embarrassingly bad.
The PIC back end is better, but not really great. None of this matters much until you're
trying to run dozens of rungs of logic with fast cycle times.
I support the A/D converter, PWM unit, and UART on those microcontrollers that provide
them. That means that you can write ladder logic that reads analog inputs, and that sends
and receives characters over serial (for example to a PC, if you add a suitable level-shifter
like a MAX232, or to a character LCD). It is possible to send arbitrary strings over serial, as
well as the values of integer variables, as ASCII text. Finally, I now support `preserved
variables' on devices with EEPROM; you can indicate that a particular variable should be
auto-saved to nonvolatile memory whenever it changes, so that its value is persistent
across power-on resets.

Limitations, and Disclaimer

http://cq.cx/ladder.pl

Of course a microcontroller with this software can't do everything that a PLC will. Most PLC
environments offer more features and predefined blocks than my tool does. The PLC
hardware is better too; usually the inputs and outputs are designed to withstand incredible
electrical abuse. You can get a PIC16F877 on a carrier board for ten or twenty USD, though,

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electrical abuse. You can get a PIC16F877 on a carrier board for ten or twenty USD, though,
and you'll pay a fair bit more for a PLC with the same capabilities.
So far I have received very few bug reports compared to the number of people with
questions or feature requests. There is still great possibility for defects, especially in the
targets for microcontrollers that I do not physically have (and therefore cannot test).
Certainly do not use LDmicro for anything safety-critical, or anything that would break
something expensive if it failed.
As noted above, the code that it generates is far from optimal. Also, not all of the data RAM
in PIC16 devices is available to the ladder logic program. This is because I have not
implemented very much support for all the paging nonsense. I do, however, support the
program memory paging, which is necessary to access program memory locations in the
PIC16 beyond 2k.

Download
The software is developed under Windows XP. It's tested under all versions from Windows
2000 to Windows 7, and unconfirmed reports suggest that it works under WINE. The
download is a .exe file; there are no other files required, so there is no installation program.
Save it somewhere on your computer and just run it, and it will work. The manual is included
in the .exe file, but you can download it separately if you want.
The compiler generates Intel IHEX files. Most of the programming software that I have seen
expects this. Of course you need some sort of programming gadget to get the hex file into
the chip. For the AVRs, I recommend an AVRISP mkII, which is available from various
distributors. For the PICs, I recommend Microchip's PICkit 2, which is available from their
web store. Both of these are officially supported, connect over USB, and cost less than 40
USD.
It should generally be possible to use code generated by LDmicro with a bootloader. Most
AVR parts have special fuses (BOOTRST, BOOTSZx) that will need to be configured for
whatever bootloader you are using. The PIC16 parts don't have any specific hardware
support for a bootloader, but LDmicro generates code with the correct format to allow the
bootloader to rewrite the reset vector.
I would appreciate any bug reports. The following chips are supported:
PIC16F628(A)
PIC16F88
PIC16F819
PIC16F877(A)
PIC16F876(A)
PIC16F887
PIC16F886
ATmega128
ATmega64
ATmega162
ATmega32
ATmega16
ATmega8
It is also possible to generate C code from the ladder program. That is less convenient, but
you could use it on any processor for which you have a C compiler.
LDmicro can generate interpretable byte code. If you are willing to write an interpreter then
you can use this to run your ladder code on any kind of target. There is not very much
documentation on this, but I provide a sample interpreter in mostly-portable C.
Pre-built executables are available in several languages:
ldmicro.exe (English)
ldmicro-de.exe (Deutsch)
ldmicro-fr.exe (Franais)
ldmicro-es.exe (Espaol)
ldmicro-tr.exe (Trke)
ldmicro-it.exe (Italiano)
ldmicro-pt.exe (Portugus)
http://cq.cx/ladder.pl

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ldmicro-pt.exe (Portugus)

The source code, and various other files, are also available for download. This program may
be distributed and modified under the terms of the GPL Version 3.
ldmicro-rel2.2.zip (source, release 2.2)
ldmicro.txt (manual)
feature / bugfix history
sample: a simplified traffic light
sample: how to drive a seven-segment display
sample: `hello, world;' it prints the string over serial
Older releases are also available:
ldmicro-rel2.1.zip
ldmicro-rel2.0.zip
ldmicro-rel1.9.zip
ldmicro-rel1.8.zip
ldmicro-rel1.7.zip
ldmicro-rel1.6.zip

(source,
(source,
(source,
(source,
(source,
(source,

release
release
release
release
release
release

2.1)
2.0)
1.9)
1.8)
1.7)
1.6)

(right-click to save any of these files)

Please report any defects. This is free software, with no department in charge of quality
control. I do not even have the hardware to test many of the targets myself. A bug that is
not reported is unlikely to ever be fixed.
I have a tutorial, in which I describe how to enter a simple ladder diagram, simulate it, and
then generate an IHEX file and program it into a PIC. That is probably the easiest way to get
started with this software.
If you have questions about LDmicro, then ask them on the forum.
August 2010, New York City; thanks to G. Mariani and A. Pedrazzi for Italian translations; H.
U. Noell for German; D. Corteletti and O. da Rocha for Portuguese; M. Vaufleury for French;
J. Pascual for Spanish; A. Akici for Turkish.

http://cq.cx/ladder.pl

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