Implementation of Marine Plug-and-Work
PUCK implementations
MBARI has implemented an "external" puck device that allows any RS232 serial instrument - commercial off-the-shelf or custom-built - to implement plug-and-work. The external puck includes two serial ports, FLASH memory, a switch, and microprocessor to interpret and execute puck protocol commands specified by a host. First, the puck is physically connected to the instrument's serial port. Now the "pucked instrument" can be plugged into a host computer, using the puck's other serial port. Any serial instrument, custom-built or commercial off-the-shelf, can be outfitted with an external puck. A description of MBARI's first puck implementation can be found here .If an instrument already includes a microprocessor and sufficient non-volatile storage within its housing, it may be programmed to implement the puck protocol. The protocol is fairly simple, and hence straightforward to implement. We refer to this implementation as an embedded puck. Embedded pucks eliminate the need for extra connectors associated with an external puck.