I wrote a simple piece of code in C# to read and write to a plc via the modbus protocol (modbus RTU), my laptop being the master and the plc being the slave.I used a modbus dll that I found online. The code works fine.
My problem is that I now need to make this into a windows service. I did a simple tutorial on this and made a basic service. But when I tried to integrate this with the modbus code I'm getting no success. C# is very new to me and theres alot of things I'm not clear off. If someone could suggest the best approach to making my modbus code into a service I'd very much appreciate it, even if they could provide some type of well commented template. The C# modbus code is as follows.
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Text;
using System.IO.Ports;
using System.IO;
using System.Net;
using System.Net.Sockets;
using System.Threading;
//using System.Data;
using Modbus.Data;
using Modbus.Device;
using Modbus.Utility;
//using System.ServiceProcess;
using System.Collections;
namespace Simple_modbus_write
{
class MainClass
{
public static void Main (string[] args)
{
SerialPort port = new SerialPort("COM6");
// configure serial port
port.BaudRate = 9600;
port.DataBits = 8;
port.Parity = Parity.None;
port.StopBits = StopBits.One;
port.Open();
// create modbus master
IModbusSerialMaster master = ModbusSerialMaster.CreateRtu(port);
byte slaveId = 1;
ushort outputAddress = 2; // this is the address of the first output of the plc
ushort inputAddress = 0; // this is the address of the first input of the plc
ushort numRegisters = 2;
// write to three coils
master.WriteMultipleCoils(slaveId,outputAddress, new bool[]{true});
// delay of 10 seconds
Thread.Sleep(10000);
// read the inputs of the plc
bool[] plc_input = master.ReadInputs(slaveId,inputAddress,numRegisters);
for (int i=0; i<plc_input.Length;i++){
// write the status of the plc inputs (i.e. true or false)
Console.WriteLine(" the input at " + i + " value is:" + plc_input[i]);}
// if the input is false (i.e. switch is off) then turn off the output
if(plc_input[0]==false && plc_input[1]==false)
{
master.WriteMultipleCoils(slaveId,outputAddress, new bool[]{false});
}
// at the end read the status of the output and print its status to the screen
bool[] plc_output = master.ReadCoils(slaveId,outputAddress,numRegisters);
for (int j=0; j<plc_input.Length;j++){
Console.WriteLine("the output at " + j + " value is:" + plc_output[j]);}
}
}
}