How to interact with other hardware?

[Teddyz]

It would be nice to be able to use peripherals that are connected via serial port in a node simulation. This way I could control relays to interact with the nodes I test. Or is IO-piggy supported?

I run Busmaster on Windows.

[Teddyz]

If this can be solved by 'simply' invoking a dll, please give me an example to start with. :)

[Teddyz]

Okay, I found a web page that explained how to use serial port I a way that I could understand. The code below is an example I made where you can use serial port to control a relay "ICSE013A". 'int8_t relay (int8_t rel, int8_t state) {

static bool firsttime = true;
static bool r1 = false;
static bool r2 = false;
static char ComPortName[] = "\\\\.\\COM19"; // default name
static HANDLE hComm;
char sendchar[8];

if ( rel == -1 ) {
    if ( hComm == INVALID_HANDLE_VALUE )
        return -1;
    CloseHandle(hComm);//Closing the Serial Port
    firsttime = true;
    return 0;
}
if ( firsttime || hComm == INVALID_HANDLE_VALUE ) {
    // open serial port
    if ( rel == 0)
        snprintf ( ComPortName, 10, "\\\\.\\COM%d", state);
    hComm = CreateFile(ComPortName, //port name
        GENERIC_WRITE, //  |GENERIC_READ, //Read/Write
        0,                            // No Sharing
        NULL,                         // No Security
        OPEN_EXISTING,// Open existing port only
        0,            // Non Overlapped I/O
        NULL);        // Null for Comm Devices
    if ( hComm == INVALID_HANDLE_VALUE )
        return -2;

    DCB dcbSerialParams = { 0 }; // Initializing DCB structure
    dcbSerialParams.DCBlength = sizeof(dcbSerialParams);

    if ( !GetCommState(hComm, &dcbSerialParams) ) //retreives  the current settings
        return -3;

    dcbSerialParams.BaudRate = CBR_9600;      // Setting BaudRate = 9600
    dcbSerialParams.ByteSize = 8;             // Setting ByteSize = 8
    dcbSerialParams.StopBits = ONESTOPBIT;    // Setting StopBits = 1
    dcbSerialParams.Parity = NOPARITY;        // Setting Parity = None 

    if ( !SetCommState(hComm, &dcbSerialParams) )  //Configuring the port according to settings in DCB 
        return -4;

    COMMTIMEOUTS timeouts = { 0 };
    timeouts.ReadIntervalTimeout         = 50;
    timeouts.ReadTotalTimeoutConstant    = 50;
    timeouts.ReadTotalTimeoutMultiplier  = 10;
    timeouts.WriteTotalTimeoutConstant   = 50;
    timeouts.WriteTotalTimeoutMultiplier = 10;

    if (SetCommTimeouts(hComm, &timeouts) == FALSE)
        return -5;

    // send init
    if ( !WriteFile(hComm, // Handle to the Serialport
    "\x50", // Data to be written to the port 
    1,   // No of bytes to write into the port
    0,  // No of bytes written to the port
    NULL) )
        return -6;
    Sleep ( 2 );
    if ( !WriteFile(hComm, // Handle to the Serialport
    "\x51", // Data to be written to the port 
    1,   // No of bytes to write into the port
    0,  // No of bytes written to the port
    NULL) )
        return -6;
    Sleep ( 2 );
    firsttime = false;
}
if ( rel == 1 || rel == 3 ) {
    if ( state )
        r1 = true;
    else
        r1 = false;
}
if ( rel == 2 || rel == 3 ) {
    if ( state )
        r2 = true;
    else
        r2 = false;
}
snprintf ( sendchar, 8, "%d", (r2<<1) | r1 );
if ( !WriteFile(hComm, // Handle to the Serialport
sendchar, // Data to be written to the port 
1, // No of bytes to write into the port
0, // No of bytes written to the port
NULL) )
    return -7;
//Trace ( " relay is done, rel=%d state = %d", rel, state );
return 0;

}'