Architecture for Control Networks
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Architecture for Control Networks (ACN) is a suite of network protocols for show control developed by Entertainment Services and Technology Association (ESTA). The first official release is formally referred to as ANSI E1.17 - 2006 - Entertainment Technology - Architecture for Control Networks.
It was designed as a replacement for DMX as the control protocol for lighting systems and can be used for controlling more complex devices like video playback servers (media servers) and audio mixers. The protocol is designed to be layered on top of UDP/IP and therefore will run over standard, inexpensive Ethernet and 802.11 (Wi-Fi) network links.
ACN relies on UDP in order to pass its messages. Where reliability is required, the Session Data Transport sub protocol allows semi-reliability of only the latest value for a particular "channel".
| Internet protocol suite |
|---|
| Application layer |
| Transport layer |
| Internet layer |
| Link layer |
Protocol architecture
ACN defines a number of sub protocols. These protocols all follow the TLV style Protocol Data Units (PDU). These can be nested in predefined hierarchy.
The Protocols defined in ANSI E1.17 are:
- Root Layer Protocol for UDP
- Session Data Transport Protocol (SDT)
- Device Management Protocol (DMP)
There is also an XML description language which defines properties of the devices which is called the Device Description Language.
Interoperability profiles
The ACN protocol may be further defined via interoperability profiles which will extend various layers of the ACN stack, or define how elements of the ACN architecture must be used in a particular situation to achieve interoperability. For example, by providing specific values for timing parameters to be used in a particular network environment.
Implementations
E1.31 (Streaming DMX over ACN) is supported on Linux (ARM; i386, x86-64), and Macintosh (PowerPC; i386, x86-64) by the Open Lighting Architecture.[1]
There is currently an OpenACN implementation project in progress which is hosted by SourceForge. This will provide open source library implementation which is intended to be portable to a variety of platforms from small embedded devices, to Windows and POSIX conformant operating systems.[2][3]
There is yet another open source ACN project on Codeplex which is implemented in C# and aims to provide a full managed code implementation of the standard and many of the sub protocols associated with ACN.[4]
See also
- Lighting control systems for buildings or residences
- Lighting control consoles for stage lighting and other DMX-512 devices
- Art-Net, a proprietary protocol for transmitting DMX-512 over UDP/IP
References
- ^ "Open Lighting Architecture". Retrieved 2012-01-05.
- ^ "OpenACN". Retrieved 2011-08-25.
- ^ "OpenACN home page". Retrieved 2011-08-25.
- ^ "Architecture for Control Networks project home page". Retrieved 5 October 2011.