Overview of BACnet/SC

The new BACnet with SC Point Manager is designed for ASHRAE 135-2020 (BACnet Protocol Revision 22) and includes support for the BACnet Secure Connect (BACnet/SC) addendum to the BACnet protocol.  It targets 135-2016 Rve 19 from BTL Certification + Addendum BJ (BACnet SC Communication).

In addition to this enhanced security, BACnet with SC comes with improved support for BACnet alarms, improved network discovery (with better filtering), and multi-channel support (allowing BACnet device ID isolation between different networks).

Along with the improved BACnet with SC Point Manager, the BACnet with SC Workbench Provider has been redesigned to work with the latest BACnet standards, including support for many new object types.  

The Data Explorer has also been improved to work with the new BACnet with SC Point Manager and take advantage of the new features. Currently, the Schedule Control does not have support for BACnet SC. We plan to add this support in future versions.  

The BACnet Classic Point Manager is still included in this version and is the default BACnet Connector. There is currently no upgrade path from a BACnet Classic configuration to a BACnet with SC configuration, but we plan to have one in future versions.  

The Project Document feature of Workbench, which allows users to generate reports about their configuration, has been enhanced to work with either BACnet point manager.

Note: In BACnet for SC, the property sheet view is only supported on the object level, not the device or root level. This was intentionally omitted because in BACnet Classic the property sheet view could overload the BACnet network when used at a high level.

Note: BACnet Classic can broadcast Time Synchronization to multiple devices, but in BACnet with SC, it can only be targeted to a single device at a time. This was intentionally omitted to help prevent issues where users accidentally changed the time on the wrong devices.

Automatic Time synchronization is available now. Multiple devices can be targeted.

Using BACnet with the SC Point Manager

To try out the BACnet with SC Point Manager:

  1. Open Workbench.

  2. Select your project in Project Explorer.

  3. From the context menu or the Home ribbon, select Configure Application(s) Settings.

  4. Uncheck BACnet Classic.

  5. Check BACnet with SC and select the desired SQL Server and Catalog. (This can be the same database where the BACnet Classic configuration is located or a different database.)

  6. If there is not already a configuration in the desired database:

    1. Select the Create or overwrite the database associated with this application button for BACnet with SC.

    2. If you are sure there is no existing BACnet with SC configuration or you're okay with overwriting it, select OK to the warning message. (This will not overwrite the BACnet Classic configuration.)

    3. Wait for the configuration to be created in the database.

  7. Apply the changes.

  8. Confirm that the Notes for BACnet with SC say Configuration Active.

  9. In Project Explorer under Data Connectivity, you should now see the BACnet with SC provider.

To switch back to BACnet Classic, follow the steps again except check BACnet Classic and uncheck BACnet with SC. Advanced users can enable both applications at the same time, but note that they share the same port, so only one point manager can run at a time. One set or the other of BACnet services must be disabled from the Windows Services control panel. (The Configure Application(s) Settings dialog takes care of this when only one application is enabled.)

There are some notable differences in the behavior of BACnet with SC and BACnet Classic that users may want to be aware of.

  • Device templates - BACnet with SC currently only has one default device template. Future versions will support multiple device templates.
  • Device status checking - In BACnet Classic, Workbench automatically detects a device's status and reflects this in the device's icon in the Workbench tree. This is done by regularly polling each device's systemStatus point. With BACnet with SC, Workbench only polls systemStatus to updates a device's status icon when the device is refreshed. This means the Workbench icons do not update automatically, but it is a more efficient use of resources. A refresh action can be manually triggered from each individual device or from the parent level of all devices.
  • Time/date and priority array format - BACnet with SC can expose time/date data types and priority arrays as JSON objects in addition to the datetime and array native types.