Patent ID: 8170066

Claim:
A method for synchronization in a serial, real-time communication system including a central participant and at least one further participant, comprising the steps of: synchronizing the at least one further participant with the central participant by transmitting a Master Data Telegram formed to comprise operating or process data, including setpoint values for process interfaces controlled by the at least one further participant, and synchronization information including at least a dedicated checksum; wherein said synchronization information is embedded in one or more subfields of a plurality of subfields comprising a data field of said Master Data Telegram, and wherein in a case where multiple subfields are required to embed all said synchronization information, each of the multiple subfields comprising said synchronization information are positioned either separated from or concatenated with each other within said data field, such that a portion of said Master Data Telegram is protected from a beginning up to and including the synchronization information, and wherein each position of the multiple subfields comprising said synchronization information within the data field is separately and unambiguously positioned in a predefined manner from subfield positions within said data field dedicated for data transmission only; and evaluating immediately after receipt of said Master Data Telegram only a portion of the bit string up to and including the one or more subfields comprising said synchronization information to obviate a need to first receive and then check the entire Master Data Telegram for corruption thereby expediting synchronization.