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PCAN-Basic

API for Connecting to CAN CC, CAN FD, and CAN XL Buses


All prices are plus the at present valid value added tax!

Description

The PCAN-Basic API (application programming interface) allows easy development of powerful software with CAN CC, CAN FD, and CAN XL support. It includes all of the functions that an application needs in order to communicate with PCAN PC hardware. The cross-operating-system design makes it possible to easily port software projects between platforms.

PCAN-Basic consists of a device driver and an interface DLL providing access to the functions. The API supports a wide array of languages, including C++, C#, C++/CLR, Pascal OO, VB.NET, Java, and Python 3.x. Beginning with version 4, PCAN-Basic supported CAN FD. In 2025, version 5 introduced support for CAN XL.

CAN XL (Extended Data-Field Length) was designed to improve the cooperation of CAN and TCP/IP networks and to enable transmitting larger data streams for use cases such as ECU flashing and software updates. For this, the new standard provides bit rates of up to 20 Mbit/s and data transmission with up to 2048 bytes per message.

Features

  • API for developing applications with CAN CC, CAN FD, and CAN XL connections
  • Support for CAN specifications CAN CC (classic CAN 2.0), CAN FD, and CAN XL (ISO 11898-1 2024)
  • Application development for the platforms Windows® 11 (x64/ARM64), 10 (x86/x64), and Linux
  • Multiple PEAK-System applications and your own can be operated on a physical channel at the same time
  • Use of up to 16 channels for each hardware type
  • Simple switching between channels of a PEAK CAN interface
  • Access to the CAN channels of a PCAN-Gateway via the PCAN-LAN hardware type
  • Driver-internal buffering of up to 32,768 CAN messages per CAN channel
  • Precision of time stamps on received messages up to 1 µs (depending on the PEAK CAN interface used)
  • Supports PEAK-System‘s trace formats
    • Version 1.1 for CAN CC recordings
    • Version 2.0 for CAN FD recordings
    • Version 3.0 for CAN XL recordings
  • Access to specific hardware parameters, such as listen-only mode
  • Notification of the application through Windows® events when a message is received
  • Support of CAN error frames
  • Extended system for debugging operations
  • Multilingual debugging output
  • Output language depends on operating system
  • Debugging information can be defined individually
  • Thread-safe API
     

PCAN-Basic for Linux

PEAK-System provides the PCAN-Basic API to allow the development of your own CAN applications for Linux. Programmers can use the languages C++, Java, and Python 3.x.
 

System requirements

  • Windows® 11 (x64/ARM64), 10 (x64), or Linux
  • For the CAN bus connection: PC CAN interface from PEAK-System
     

Functions

Connection:

  • Initialize: Initialize CAN hardware, set the bit rate, log on at the driver
  • InitializeFD: Initialize CAN FD hardware
  • InitializeXL: Initialize CAN XL hardware
  • Uninitialize: Log off from the driver

Configuration:

  • SetValue: Setup of hardware parameters such as debug log, listen-only, and auto-reset
  • FilterMessages: Register messages to be received

Information:

  • GetValue: Read out DLL and API information
  • GetStatus: Read out CAN bus status information
  • GetErrorText: Get an error code description

CAN communication:

  • Read: Read a CAN message or status incl. time stamp
  • ReadFD: Read a CAN FD message
  • ReadXL: Read a CAN XL message
  • Write: Transmit a CAN message (11/29-bit ID and RTR possible)
  • WriteFD: Transmit a CAN FD message
  • WriteXL: Transmit a CAN XL message
  • Reset: Clear the transmit and receive buffer or perform a hardware reset

Scope of Supply

  • PCAN-Basic interface DLLs (x86/x64/ARM64)
  • PCAN-Basic.NET Assembly
  • Examples and header files for all common programming languages
  • Documentation in PDF and HTML Help format

Downloads

PCAN-Basic API 5.x

API for the development of applications with CAN CC, CAN FD, and CAN XL connections for Windows® 11 (x64/ARM64), 10 (x64).

Download

PCAN-Basic API (Linux)

API for the development of applications with CAN connection for Linux.

Download

PCAN-Basic.NET Assembly

The PCAN-Basic.NET Assembly is available as a package in the NuGet Gallery. The online documentation is available on our website.

Documentation NuGet Gallery

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Additional information