Aspects of the present invention provide a ring supervisor operating as a server for maintaining and allocating addresses for devices in a ring topology. The ring supervisor may obtain an ordered list of devices in the ring by sending a data collection frame that passes through each device around the ring with each device appending its preconfigured address information. The ring supervisor may then operate to apply the addressing provided by each device, or alternatively, allocate different addresses to each device from a separate pool. As a result, control program software for ring devices can be developed using a general pool of addresses without requiring specific knowledge of actual addresses. Also, if a device requires replacement, the device may be replaced without requiring modification to the control program to provide the address for the replacement device.