Modbus TCP and RTU over TCP protocol client

• Modbus TCP/IP specification: http://www.modbus.org/specs.php
• Modbus TCP/IP and RTU simpler description: http://www.simplymodbus.ca/TCP.htm

Installation

Use Composer to install this library as dependency.

composer require aldas/modbus-tcp-client

Supported functions

• FC1 - Read Coils (ReadCoilsRequest / ReadCoilsResponse)
• FC2 - Read Input Discretes (ReadInputDiscretesRequest / ReadInputDiscretesResponse)
• FC3 - Read Holding Registers (ReadHoldingRegistersRequest / ReadHoldingRegistersResponse)
• FC4 - Read Input Registers (ReadInputRegistersRequest / ReadInputRegistersResponse)
• FC5 - Write Single Coil (WriteSingleCoilRequest / WriteSingleCoilResponse)
• FC6 - Write Single Register (WriteSingleRegisterRequest / WriteSingleRegisterResponse)
• FC11 - Get Communication Event Counter (GetCommEventCounterRequest / GetCommEventCounterResponse)
• FC15 - Write Multiple Coils (WriteMultipleCoilsRequest / WriteMultipleCoilsResponse)
• FC16 - Write Multiple Registers (WriteMultipleRegistersRequest / WriteMultipleRegistersResponse)
• FC17 - Report Server ID (ReportServerIDRequest / ReportServerIDResponse)
• FC22 - Mask Write Register (MaskWriteRegisterRequest / MaskWriteRegisterResponse)
• FC23 - Read / Write Multiple Registers (ReadWriteMultipleRegistersRequest / ReadWriteMultipleRegistersResponse)

Utility functions

• Packet::isCompleteLength - checks if data is complete Modbus TCP request or response packet
• Packet::isCompleteLengthRTU() - checks if data is complete Modbus RTU response packet
• ErrorResponse::is - checks if data is Modbus TCP error packet

Requirements

• PHP 8.0+
• Release 2.4.0 was last to support PHP 7 (7.4 might work with v3.0.0)
• Release 0.2.0 was last to support PHP 5.6

Intention

This library is influenced by phpmodbus library and meant to be provide decoupled Modbus protocol (request/response packets) and networking related features so you could build modbus client with our own choice of networking code (ext_sockets/streams/Reactphp/Amp asynchronous streams) or use library provided networking classes (php Streams)

Endianness

Applies to multibyte data that are stored in Word/Double/Quad word registers basically everything that is not (u)int16/byte/char.

So if we receive from network 0x12345678 (bytes: ABCD) and want to convert that to a 32 bit register there could be 4 different ways to interpret bytes and word order depending on modbus server architecture and client architecture. NB: TCP, and UDP, are transmitted in big-endian order so we choose this as base for examples

Library supports following byte and word orders:

• Big endian (ABCD - word1 = 0x1234, word2 = 0x5678)
• Big endian low word first (CDAB - word1 = 0x5678, word2 = 0x1234) (used by Wago-750)
• Little endian (DCBA - word1 = 0x3412, word2 = 0x7856)
• Little endian low word first (BADC - word1 = 0x7856, word2 = 0x3412)

Default (global) endianess used for parsing can be changed with:

Endian::$defaultEndian = Endian::BIG_ENDIAN_LOW_WORD_FIRST;

For non-global cases see API methods argument list if method support using custom endianess.

See Endian.php for additional info and Types.php for supported data types.

Data types

Modbus is binary protocol which revolves about addresses of Registers/Word (16bit, 2 byte of data) and Coils (1 bit of data). Coils are booleans but Register/Word or multiple Registers can hold different data types. Following is ways to access different data types from Registers:

Most of the for data types have optional arguments for providing Endian type. By default data is parsed as being Big Endian Low Word first endian.

Exaple: getting uint32 value as Little Endian Low Word First

$dword->getUInt32(Endian::LITTLE_ENDIAN | Endian::LOW_WORD_FIRST);

1bit - 16bit data types

1-16bit data types are hold by Word class which hold 2 bytes of data.

$address = 100;
$word = $response->getWordAt($address);

Following methods exists to get different types out of single Word instance:

• boolean - 1bit, true/false, $word->isBitSet(11)
• byte - 8bit, 1 byte, range 0 to 255
  • first byte of Word (0) $word->getHighByteAsInt()
  • last byte of Word (1) $word->getLowByteAsInt()
• uint16 - 16bit, 2 byte, range 0 to 65535 $word->getUInt16()
• int16 - 16bit, 2 byte, range -32768 to 32767 $word->getInt16()

and following additional methods:

• $word->getBytes() return Words as array of 2 integers (0-255)

32bit data types

17-32bit data types are hold by DoubleWord class which hold 4 bytes of data.

$address = 100;
$dword = $response->getDoubleWordAt($address);

Following methods exists to get different types out of single DoubleWord instance:

• uint32 - 32bit, 4 bytes, range 0 to 4294967295, $dword->getUInt32()
• int32 - 64bit, 8 bytes, range -2147483648 to 2147483647, $dword->getInt32()
• float - 64bit, 8 bytes, range -3.4e+38 to 3.4e+38, $dword->getFloat()

and following additional methods:

• $dword->getBytes() return DoubleWord as array of 4 integers (0-255)
• $dword->getHighBytesAsWord() returns first 2 bytes as Word
• $dword->getLowBytesAsWord() returns last 2 bytes as Word

64bit data types

64bit data types are hold by QuadWord class which hold 8 bytes of data. NB: 64-bit PHP supports only up to 63-bit (signed) integers.

$address = 100;
$qword = $response->getQuadWordAt($address);

Following methods exists to get different types out of single QuadWord instance:

• uint32 - 64bit, 8 bytes, range 0 to 9223372036854775807, $dword->getUInt64()
• int32 - 64bit, 8 bytes, range -9223372036854775808 to 9223372036854775807, $dword->getInt64()
• double - 64bit, 8 bytes, range 2.2250738585072e-308 to 1.7976931348623e+308, $dword->getDouble()

and following additional methods:

• $qword->getBytes() return QuadWord as array of 8 integers (0-255)
• $qword->getHighBytesAsDoubleWord() returns first 4 bytes as DoubleWord
• $qword->getLowBytesAsDoubleWord() returns last 4 bytes as DoubleWord

Strings

ASCII (8bit character) string can be extracted from response as utf-8 string

$address = 20;
$length = 10;
$string = $response->getAsciiStringAt($address, $length);

Example of Modbus TCP (fc3 - read holding registers)

Some of the Modbus function examples are in examples/ folder

Advanced usage:

• command line poller with ReachPHP examples/example_cli_poller.php
• send/recieve packets parallel using non-blocking IO:
  • using ReactPHP see 'examples/example_parallel_requests_reactphp.php'
  • using Amp see 'examples/example_parallel_requests_amp.php'

Request multiple packets with higher level API:

$address = 'tcp://127.0.0.1:5022';
$unitID = 0; // also known as 'slave ID'
$fc3 = ReadRegistersBuilder::newReadHoldingRegisters($address, $unitID)
    ->unaddressableRanges([[100,110], [1512]])
    ->bit(256, 15, 'pump2_feedbackalarm_do')
    // will be split into 2 requests as 1 request can return only range of 124 registers max
    ->int16(657, 'battery3_voltage_wo')
    // will be another request as uri is different for subsequent int16 register
    ->useUri('tcp://127.0.0.1:5023')
    ->string(
        669,
        10,
        'username_plc2',
        function ($value, $address, $response) {
            return 'prefix_' . $value; // optional: transform value after extraction
        },
        function (\Exception $exception, Address $address, $response) {
            // optional: callback called then extraction failed with an error
            return $address->getType() === Address::TYPE_STRING ? '' : null; // does not make sense but gives you an idea
        }
    )
    ->build(); // returns array of 3 ReadHoldingRegistersRequest requests

// this will use PHP non-blocking stream io to recieve responses
$responseContainer = (new NonBlockingClient(['readTimeoutSec' => 0.2]))->sendRequests($fc3);
print_r($responseContainer->getData()); // array of assoc. arrays (keyed by address name)
print_r($responseContainer->getErrors());

Response structure

[
    [ 'pump2_feedbackalarm_do' => true, ],
    [ 'battery3_voltage_wo' => 12, ],
    [ 'username_plc2' => 'prefix_admin', ]
]

Low level - send packets:

$connection = BinaryStreamConnection::getBuilder()
    ->setHost('192.168.0.1')
    ->build();
    
$packet = new ReadHoldingRegistersRequest(256, 8); //create FC3 request packet

try {
    $binaryData = $connection->connect()->sendAndReceive($packet);

    //parse binary data to response object
    $response = ResponseFactory::parseResponseOrThrow($binaryData);
    
    //same as 'foreach ($response->getWords() as $word) {'
    foreach ($response as $word) { 
        print_r($word->getInt16());
    }
    // print registers as double words in big endian low word first order (as WAGO-750 does)
    foreach ($response->getDoubleWords() as $dword) {
        print_r($dword->getInt32(Endian::BIG_ENDIAN_LOW_WORD_FIRST));
    }
        
    // set internal index to match start address to simplify array access
    $responseWithStartAddress = $response->withStartAddress(256);
    print_r($responseWithStartAddress[256]->getBytes()); // use array access to get word
    print_r($responseWithStartAddress->getDoubleWordAt(257)->getFloat());
} catch (Exception $exception) {
    echo $exception->getMessage() . PHP_EOL;
} finally {
    $connection->close();
}

Example of Modbus RTU over TCP

Difference between Modbus RTU and Modbus TCP is that:

1. RTU header contains only slave id. TCP/IP header contains of transaction id, protocol id, length, unitid
2. RTU packed has 2 byte CRC appended

See http://www.simplymodbus.ca/TCP.htm for more detailsed explanation

This library was/is originally meant for Modbus TCP but it has support to convert packet to RTU and from RTU. See this examples/rtu.php for example.

$rtuBinaryPacket = RtuConverter::toRtu(new ReadHoldingRegistersRequest($startAddress, $quantity, $slaveId));
$binaryData = $connection->connect()->sendAndReceive($rtuBinaryPacket);
$responseAsTcpPacket = RtuConverter::fromRtu($binaryData);

Example of Modbus RTU over USB to Serial (RS485) adapter

See Linux example in 'examples/rtu_usb_to_serial.php'

Example of Modbus RTU over TCP + higher level API usage

See example in 'examples/rtu_over_tcp_with_higherlevel_api.php'

Example of non-blocking socket IO with ReactPHP/Amp (i.e. modbus request are run in 'parallel')

• 'examples/example_parallel_requests_reactphp.php - example of non-blocking socket IO with ReactPHP socket library (https://github.com/reactphp/socket)
• 'examples/example_parallel_requests_amp.php - example of non-blocking socket IO with Amp socket library https://github.com/amphp/socket

Example Modbus server (accepting requests) with ReactPHP

• 'examples/example_response_server.php - example of modbus server

Try communication with PLCs quickly using php built-in web server

Examples folder has index.php which can be used with php built-in web server to test out communication with our own PLCs.

git clone https://github.com/aldas/modbus-tcp-client.git
cd modbus-tcp-client
composer install
php -S localhost:8080 -t examples/

Now open http://localhost:8080 in browser. See additional query parameters from index.php.

Changelog

See CHANGELOG.md

Tests

• all composer test
• unit tests composer test-unit
• integration tests composer test-integration

For Windows users:

• all vendor/bin/phpunit
• unit tests vendor/bin/phpunit --testsuite 'unit-tests'
• integration tests vendor/bin/phpunit --testsuite 'integration-tests'

Static analysis

Run PHPStan analysis compose check