Using Worldfip for Synchronization and Time Stamping in the LHC Accelerator

Time is one of the key topics in the construction of particle accelerators for which very accurate synchronization and high resolution time stamping are required. Nowadays, accelerator control systems may profit of the same industrial components than automotive industries and oil refineries are using: PLCs and Fieldbuses. WorldFIP, one of the three fieldbuses that have been selected at CERN, is the only one that is intrinsically deterministic. Therefore, in addition to the general control and monitoring functions that any fieldbus may provide, its determinism brings in the unique capability of transmitting time related data for setting to the same value the clocks of the equipment. With the use of the GPS, any equipment located around the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) accelerator may thus be exactly in phase with the Universal Time. Thanks to its judicious design, WorldFIP supports also many other very interesting features like Web or video transmission. Current developments around this powerful fieldbus will also be described.