Network Bridge

Hi, having a problem with a network bridge. The system has 9 networks, 5 of which are connected by cni's, with sub networks connected by bridges.(the max number is only two on a network.
Example Building#1
Main connection to Schedule Plus is a CNI-Net1
Net1 Connects Bridge1 (Net2) and Bridge2(Net3)

Every now again a bridge appears to lock out, and we can't see that network. So if we unplug the bridge and plug it back in again it works fine.
So the questions are.
What is causing the bridge to lock out?
Is there a way to reset the bridge without having to unplug?

 

Can you provide some more information about your site? Are you running Schedule Plus? If so, what version? Network topology? Firmware version of bridges?

Have you checked that each network has reliable comms by itself? i.e. can you scan each network reliably using Toolkit?

 

Hi Newman

Schedule Plus unlimited network is being used. version 3.9.0
Toolkit version 1.9.3
We are trying to convince the client to upgrade the packages !! but the problem is he does not wont to pay, and i dont to pay because this is a project we have taken over from another company.

Network Drg attached

The system and bridges are mainley stable, and the network are accessable via toolkit. Well until they seem to lock out. Then the only way to view the affected network is to unplug the cni or bridge and then all is ok.
It is not just one bridge, it has been ramdom. The system can be stable for a day, week, a month, then networks seem to drop and resync. Schedule Plus say the network is in error and is resyncing, however toolkit can open the network and view the devices, when this is done Schedule Plus reports all networks are ok. But every now and again, toolkit cant open a bridged network. Toolkit keeps saying waiting for bridge. This is when we need to unplug the effected bridge.

 

Just out of curiousity, are those CNI's remote sites connected via the internet/VPN, or are they just several buildings on one site connected over a LAN?

 

Hi
They are remote buildings on a college campus. We are using the college IT network to bring them to a single point pc running schedule plus.
We have been experiencing problems with schedule plus going off line on buildings. What we are trying to sort out is it a cbus issue or is there seeming on the IT network causing the issues. Of course the IT department says it not their network. But we have no way of proving it or not.

 

Bridge firmware version?

 

Brdige Firmware 4.2.00 4.4.00 4.6.00 4.1.00
Seems we have many types. Is there a way to upgrade the firm uin the units to the latest version??

 

I'm only assuming things here, so dont take anything I say as gospel.

It's possible, that latency over the TCP/IP network may be an issue at certain times. If the Uni's fibre-optic backbone becomes congested during peak times, it may cause issues for communication between the S+ PC and the CNI's.

It's also quite possible that the IT department regard C-Bus traffic as being a lower priority than say backups, or research data being sent across the LAN/Backbone, especially considering most C-Bus traffic on their network may be very minimal compared to other data, and so in their mind not as time-sensitive.
If thats even possibly the case, it might pay to have the S+ PC send PING requests to the remote networks on a regular basis, so that you can get a site survey of traffic round-trip times during different times of the day.

Then again, I could be totally wrong.

 

Sounds to me like you need to logically work through the possible causes with Tech Support.