Over the course of time, numerous functions have migrated into the automobile, which in turn have contributed to making car driving more and more convenient. The fact that modern convenience functions require a lot of sensors and actuators is usually hidden to car drivers. For a long time it was usual practice to connect the constantly growing number of sensors and actuators directly to a central ECU. However, costs, space requirements and weight continually increased, while reliability decreased, making developers quickly recognize the advantages of networking sensors and actuators via a serial bus system.
Since from the start the CAN bus did not even come into consideration for the cost-sensitive sub-bus area or sensor/actuator area (also referred to as Class A), as early as in the mid-1990s many automotive OEMs and suppliers began to develop suitable solutions that could satisfy sub-bus requirements. These solutions gradually disappeared from the scene, except for one: LIN (Local Interconnect Network). An important reason for this was the founding of the LIN consortium that was a framework in which renowned automotive OEMs and suppliers as well as semiconductor and tool producers came together to create an OEM-independent communication standard for the sensor/actuator area.
Today, eight years after the founding of the LIN consortium, LIN has become established as a sub-bus. The figure shows a typical use of LIN in the motor vehicle. LIN master functionality for controlling the exchange of data in the sub-bus area resides in the associated CAN node. This transforms the CAN node into a gateway.
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