InES PTP v2 application  Status : ACTIVE

Product Information

Description

The Precision Time Protocol (PTP) which is defined in the IEEE 1588 (2002 and 2008) standards enables precise synchronization of clocks in multicast capable networks such as Ethernet. By using hardware to generate precise timestamps for messages, synchronization accuracy within some 100 nanoseconds can be achieved. Such precise synchronization is needed in measurement and control systems as well as in other distributed systems. The Institute of Embedded Systems (InES) is addressing the practical implementation and application of PTP. The institute is actively involved in the IEEE 1588 committee to further develop the standard and to ensure that it is suitable for practical applications. Furthermore, the InES offers PTP Software, PTP hardware, training, support, and so on.

Features

Requirements from new application areas and new ideas for how PTP can further be improved have triggered standard revision activities. On March 20, 2005, the Standards Board of the IEEE Standards Association approved the Project Authorization Request. It authorizes the P1588 Working Group to extend the original IEEE 1588 standard.

Some important enhancements, among others, are:

• Enablers for increased accuracy (higher timestamp resolution, shorter sync intervals, correction field)
• New clock types: the peer-to-peer and the end-to-end transparent clocks are designed to improve synchronization in linear topology (for example, daisy-chained clocks) by avoiding cascaded servos
• Rapid reconfiguration after network topology changes
• Fault tolerance
• Unicast operation
• New mappings (for example, PTP directly on Ethernet MAC layer, without IP/UDP)
• Flexible extension mechanism

InES is committed to PTPv2 and has, together with Hirschmann Automation and Control, developed a pre-standard prototype implementation of an end-to-end transparent clock. The prototype was presented at the 2006 Conference on IEEE 1588 in Gaithersburg.