System and method for serial port transparent transmission and program updating in internet range

Abstract

The invention discloses a system for serial port transparent transmission and program updating in an internet range. The system is characterized by comprising n communication apparatuses, an updatingcontrol terminal, an MQTT server and n target devices; and the ith communication apparatus is only connected with the ith target device. According to the system, when both transmission parties are connected to the internet through a router allocated with a private IP or general network frameworks of other NAT devices, point-to-point serial port transparent transmission in the internet range is realized; and seamless secure updating of a remote program can be realized through the internet under the condition that the target devices do not need to perform any operation and original program codesare not modified, so that data transmission and behavior updating of industrial control equipment and household appliances in the internet range are realized under the condition of not increasing additional development workload.

Description

technical field [0001] The invention relates to a communication system, in particular to a system and method for realizing serial port transparent transmission and remote program update within the Internet range. It is mainly used to connect devices with Internet communication requirements, such as embedded microcontrollers, digital signal processors, and FPGAs used in industrial control and smart home, to the Internet with few changes to the original design and realize serial port transparent transmission and program Update online. Background technique [0002] With the development of Internet of Things technology, more and more industrial equipment and household appliances have begun to display and change their working status through data transmission within the scope of the Internet, as well as optimize their behavior through their own program updates. However, most industrial equipment and household appliances require a relatively low amount of calculation for control, ...

AI Technical Summary

Problems solved by technology

Such as Chinese patent 201610029034.2 and Chinese patent 201620167221.2, this type of invention provides a communication module based on the TCP protocol, which belongs to the communication class of the transport layer protocol. The IP address of the connection and an open port, otherwise the connection initiator cannot establish an incoming connection to the recipient. This condition can be satisfied when the local IP is allocated in the local area network, but when the communication range extends to the Internet, due to the Internet IP Due to the exhaustion of addresses and the need for network security, the egress IPs obtained by home network users are all converted by NAT, not public IPs. Even if the network egress of enterprise network users may be public IPs, it is impossible to target each communication module on the egress IP. Open a port and configure related access rules. In both cases, when performing point-to-point communication, the IP address of the party receiving the connection cannot be accessed by the connection initiator. Therefore, this type of communication module can only use Client / Server within the Internet range. Architecture, it is necessary to fix a server with public network IP and open port as the communication party, which cannot realize point-to-point communication, and cannot realize serial port transparent transmission

[0004] For example, Chinese patent 201510496705.1 provides a wired serial-to-Ethernet data transmission device. This device uses the MQTT Internet of Things protocol as the application layer protocol for part of the message transmission of the communication device itself on the basis of the transport layer TCP protocol. It seems that the transmission range has been expanded, but the device specification [0014] and [0015] clearly pointed out that the MQTT protocol is only applicable to the communication between the transmission device itself and other transmission devices, and the RS-232 serial port data transmitted by the external target device , still use the transport layer TCP or UDP protocol for transmission

Therefore, for the target device sending serial data, this module is the same as the above-mentioned module, and still belongs to the communication category of the transport layer protocol. The communication range is limited to the local area network, and the serial port transparent transmission within the Internet range cannot be realized.

Moreover, the Ethernet access of the device must be connected with a network cable through the RJ-45 interface, and wireless communication cannot be realized. In smart home application scenarios, it is difficult to connect various objects such as light bulbs, smart speakers, washing machines, and Network terminal connected to the network cable

[0005] For example, the article "Implementation Method of Remote Control of IoT Terminal Based on Serial Port to WiFi" published in Volume 25 "Computer Measurement and Control" in 2017, although using WiFi to access Ethernet avoids network cable connection, but in terms of data transmission, Similar to the aforementioned device, only the MQTT protocol is used for sending and receiving control commands. For the serial port data of external devices, the TCP or UDP protocol is still used for transmission, so it is still impossible to realize serial port transparent transmission within the Internet range.

[0006] To sum up, the existing communication devices on the market that transmit data through serial ports all use connection-oriented transport layer protocols for communication. When communication within the Internet range is required, due to the general limitations of the existing network architecture, only It can realize the communication between the communication device and the network server, and if the network server forwards the data to other communication devices at the transport layer, it needs to allocate a transport layer port for each communication device, and maintain a list of all communication devices. The routing table of the device, which is basically impossible to achieve when the number of communicating parties is large, so none of the above communication devices can realize point-to-point communication within the Internet range, nor can it realize serial port transparent transmission within the Internet range

[0007] At present, with the increase of embedded system functions and the complexity of program code, on the one hand, it is inevitable that the program will have behavioral defects or even security vulnerabilities. Failure to update the code in time will affect product operation and even personal safety. There is a need to update programs to upgrade and optimize functions, but the existing IoT communication modules represented by the aforementioned patents often only implement data transmission functions, and there is no solution for program updates. Traditionally, manufacturers of industrial equipment and household Updates often require product recalls. For large-scale equipment, it is even necessary to send engineers to the installation site for firmware updates, resulting in a huge waste of manpower and material resources.

[0008] In recent years, some consumer electronic products with networking functions have begun to use OTA technology to remotely update their own programs, such as "Design and Implementation of Remotely Updating ARM Programs" published in Volume 4 of "Electronic Technology and Software Engineering" in 2014, Both use the program code of the microcontroller of the target device to realize this function, but because it involves the erasing and rewriting of the controller's own program code, the development workload is heavy and difficult, and it is difficult for equipment developers to realize

Moreover, if there are problems such as power failure and crash when the device updates its own program, the update is interrupted, because the data in the program memory is not completely written at this time, the device will be unusable, and the OTA program cannot be run again for remote repair.

Moreover, target devices used for smart home and industrial control, such as digital signal processors and most embedded microprocessors, do not support rewriting their own programs through their own instructions or cannot process network data packets, and cannot use this method to program renew

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