On 06/07/2022 16:46, Gerry Hull wrote:
Great info, Dave.
Thanks...
Might be a little technical for some users.
Well, this is a "technical" hobby, and such technicalities are not
going to go away anytime soon I suspect. Especially in regards to the
use of computers in the shack.
The #1 problem most hams have is they plug their USB-To-Serial
adapters into different USB ports, and the COM port number changes.
That is well known, and can be managed, especially with devices
that have a unique "identifying feature" in their USB descriptor that
the OS sees. (FTDI rule the roost in that matter!)
Not only that, Windows leaves the old port number reserved much of the
time.
Yep, but again, that can be managed, using USBDview if nothing else.
I have an in-depth blog post which talks about this in layman's terms
on my blog. See
https://blog.remote.radio/2020/11/automation-in-amateur-radio-rs-232-for.html
Good info, but many of the hardware solutions (that do work well)
edgeport etc are beyond the purchasing ability of many Hams. Plus, they
rarely show up surplus or at ham-flea markets (here in the UK at least...)
Lantronix are more well known for their LANPort devices. Very
good, but needs a certain level of knowledge to use, plus application
software needs to be able to use TCP/IP connections to other devices.
(Or tunnel a VCP over a network link.)
As explained in that blog article, there is a way to solve this
problem. Digi, a company who has been in the business for many
decades, has a series of USB-to-Serial adapters
called Edgeport, from 1 to 16 ports. The great thing about Edgeport
devices is they have a driver and utility. If you use that, the COM
port number is associated with
the BOX, not where it is plugged in.
Edgeport devices are quite expensive when new, but can often be found
on the surplus market (ebay, etc). They have been used to do baudot
by hams for decades. I use them all over the place.
I have 4,8, and 16-port USB-to-serials that are surplus to my needs if
anyone is interested.
They solve the RS-232 port issue every time!
The simplest solution, is to (sorry) learn and understand the
issue, then use stable and easy to uniquely enumerate devices, (FTDI is
the only vendor that shows unique serial numbers AFIK.)
As before, Ham Radio is a Technical Hobby by it's nature, it
worries me sometimes when even highly respected Hams who can and have
worked the world (i.e. are Superb operators with worked all continents
on many bands and modes etc) seem to know very little about the
technical aspects of the kit they own and use.
73,
Gerry Hull, *W1VE *Hancock, NH USA
CWOps #191 | YCCC | CanAm Contest Coalition | Maritime Contest Club
RadioSport Manitoba | ARRL | RAC | QCWA
ARCluster dxc.w1ve.com <http://dxc.w1ve.com> | Telnet or telnet:7373
access | RBN direct feeds
73.
Dave G0WBX(G8KBV) A "no one" in Ham terms. No awards, no WAC,
WAB, or whatever. But I can diagnose faults, fix and adapt stuff.
On Sun, Jul 3, 2022 at 7:04 AM Dave B via Elecraft
<elecraft@mailman.qth.net> wrote:
FYI...
Windows users, can use these utilities to find out what is/was
connected
to their PC's by USB etc...
USBview: A Microsoft (was System Internals who MS bought) tool.
The easiest way to find it is here:- https://ftdichip.com/utilities/
"Microsoft USBView - USB Connection Viewer"
There is a link to download a zipfile that contains it:-
https://ftdichip.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/usbview.zip
That contains a single stand-alone exe file that is the utility.
Put it
in a folder of it's own, and create a shortcut to it for your desktop.
(Also a link to a Linux version, that does work, but needs compiling
from source, and running using sudo as it needs elevated rights to
read
the running configuration files to get the information to display.)
Another similar tool is USBDview
https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/usb_devices_view.html
That shows a much more detailed list of what Windows knows about,
that
is, any USB device that was ever connected since windows was
initially
installed, regardless of if it was ever used!
You can also delete instances of old / defunct devices easily with
this
very useful tool.
(Some AV tools say it's suspect or malicious. Use VirusTotal.com to
verify if it (or anything else) is bad, on a file by file, or webpage
basis. )
Note that if for whatever reason Windows (or Linux) re-enumerates
things, the linkage between a physical device and it's COM port
number
can (and often does!) change. Seemingly at the will of some minor
deity
somewhere... That of course, will break any software that
expects some
specific device to be at a specific COM port.
Windows has the means to "Fix" that. (Known to work up to Win10,
that I
have personally tested it on.)
Find those details here:-
https://sourceforge.net/p/fldigi/wiki/windows_com_howto/
I wrote much of that after hours of "fun" some years ago... As above,
it works well with Win-10.
For Linux users, look up and explore the world of "udev rules". But...
They are only really easy to setup, if a USB device has a unique
"something" in it's USB descriptor, that the OS uses to identify it.
Such as a Serial Number. FTDI devices have unique sn's, but
Prolific,
SiLabs and others sadly do not. So, it gets funky if you have
several
of the same type of device that all "look the same" to the OS.
(Newer genuine FTDI devices also have the ability to have that serial
number (and some other settings) re-programmed! Fakes seem to
take the
reprogramming, but the new data does not "stick". Don't ask how I
found
that out!)
However, you can use the "connection path" between the OS and the
Device, as a deciding factor, but then you are forced into hooking
everything up "EXACTLY" the same each time. (Hub's and all...)
But it
does work.
Using them, you create "symbolic links" to the actual port used,
so for
example my VHF radio appears as /dev/ttyFT736 Regardless of which
hole
I connect it's associated FTDI serial adapter to on the PC (or via
any
hubs!) Or what /dev/ttyUSB* the OS re-assigns it to if things are
re-enumerated for whatever reason.)
For example, this is the rule for my ancient FT-736
#FT-736r
SUBSYSTEM=="tty", ATTRS{serial}=="A50285BI", SYMLINK+="ttyFT736"
Flrig and most other software both accept symlinks and work well.
(For the odd software title that insists on using the full
/dev/ttyUSBx
for example, they often store their settings in a file that can
often be
edited with a text editor, where you can in effect force-feed it the
symlink. The fun part is finding where that is stored!)
The exact details of how to use udev rules are way to much for this
list, but as usual, there are many websites that can furnish such
info,
plus some examples. Has to be said though, different "flavors" of
Linux, often store such rules in subtly different places to others.
I have zero experience of Apple Mac's. But they use a custom
version of
BSD as their OS, that is more like Unix than Linux. So it is likely
some if not all of the above could work on them too. If Apple let you
dig that deep and meddle...
Hope some of the above helps, and or gives people some ideas how
to tame
things.
73.
Dave G0WBX(G8KBV)
--
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