Hello there people.

ive been using visualmicro for a couple of days now and i know now how to debug my arduino programs.

now my question is the following:
How can i make a windows form that takes the data from my arduino and visualize it without using the serial port communication... ive seen many ways to control the arduino with visual studio through the serial port, making it send and recieve data with small messages.

Now what i want to accomplish is the exact opposite, i want to connect my arduino to my computer and i want my windows aplication to read the events i set, for example: i press a button and depending on which pin it is connected it will make a box red indicating i have pressed the button on my arduino related to that box.... 

i know the digitalpin example with the debugger does that but i have failed to understand how it is done... can anybody please help me with that?

here is what i want:

Hey there.

well Tim as you see the debugger you made does not use the serial port, it reads directly from the arduino chip without having to put in a code into the serial communications port.

When debugging a arduino code with you're debugger i can put the code directly in and i have no need to use the serial port to see what the arduino is doing, that is what i want.

Basically what i want Tim is to know whats happening with the arduino  and see it on the pc, your debugger does exactly what i want but i DONT want it in form of a debugger. i want it as a real time event viewer that just checks the state of every pin i have connected in a WINDOWS FORM and nothing else.

But nobody seems to understand me. i DO NOT want to control the ARDUINO with my program , INSTEAD i want to SEE what is happening with the ARDUINO, i want to see WHAT is being done with it which BUTTON is pressed, what value has the ANALOG read, etc....   

I don't want to use the serialport because i want to send messages through that AND independently read the data from it..... it cant be that hard

Okay I think there is some confusing here. The Visual Studio debugger DOES use serial. 
The debugger works by adding special hidden serial instructions to your program when you debug compile. The plugin then looks for these special serial messages so that it can show you information in the debug windows such as expressions, digital pins, trace etc.

There is no hardware debug for arduino so this debugger is a simple solution to a difficult problem 

When I find time I plan to make some examples of what you want to do. The examples would be unconnected to the debugger but would be useful for many new users who want to do what you have described.

In any event you have to communicate with the arduino some way. Either serial, or network (with a arduino LAN connection), or bluetooth (still serial) or something else??

It sounds like you do not need the debugger or your own arduino code. Instead why not look at http://arduino.cc/en/Reference/Firmata

Tim,

Perhaps I'm missing something, but if the debugger isn't running, can't an Arduino application simply read/write to Serial0, and have the PC application monitor the COM port that represents the Arduino?  Of course, it's even a bit simpler to use a USB/Serial adaptor, and another Arduino serial port, as I've been doing, so it's not necessary to "share" with the downloader and debugger.

Regards,
Ray L.

Hey Tim.

basically that is what i wanted to know i taught the debugger was reading from the arduino directly without adding any codes.

But i had it all wrong. So basically to make everything in my mind clear is the following:

1-the debugger ADDS some secret arduino code that the regular user doesn't see .
2-The secret code DOES use the serial communication but instead of using the main serial communication it uses SOFTWARE SERIAL for each and every PIN in the arduino itself  to report status.
3-To make the Arduino compatible with a windows form i will need to add several serial ports to the windows form and send messages to each serial port when its HIGH or LOW correct?. But to make that happen i will need a separate arduino class which has all pins with software serial communication sending a message whenever a change has been made.

I will start reading about Firmata and the software serial communication.

but if any of you already has something for me it will be greatly appreciated 

I will start making regular serial communication programs to understand how everything works between them  .

After i actually know how to use simple serial communication with arduino then i will start messing with making several pins a serial communication....

also i will try to check that code located in the temp folder to see how you do ite ...

i think that from here on i can handle my own hehe thanks for the great software tim and ill keep you guys updated for any questions or doubts on making this program

I have a very simple C# SerialPort class you might find helpful on the PC side - if you start your application, THEN plug in the Arduino or USB serial adaptor, it will automatically find the port, and open it for you.  You don't have to tell it what COM port to connect to.  I don't know how to post it here, since there does not seem to be a way to post files, and the source code, while small, is still over the 4,000 character limit.

On the Arduino side, all you have to do is 

Serial.begin(BAUDRATE);  // BAUDATE == the numeric baudrate you want to use.

Serial.print("Any String"); // to print a string to the serial port

You can also use Serial1, Serial2, Serial3, if your Arduino board supports multiple serial ports.



Regards,
Ray L.

Hey mister Ray & Tim.

Ive been advancing very much in my little proyect and finally got the hand of it, right now im using the regular Serial communication and im slowly advancing on using SoftwareSerial...


here is a little sketch off my advancement and also how the program is looking. later when i complete my proyect ill post it, ill make sure its compatible with any arduino.

windows form:


hardware sketch:


i hope you guys are liking it up until now  .

PS: right now my problem is that the softwareserial does not turn off even if i use Serial1.end().... very weird well if you guys have any recomendations please post it!!! .

also thank you guys so much in helping me out.

RayLivingston wrote on Dec 2^nd, 2012 at 8:33pm:


Hey Ray.

Basically i want to control my serialport by turning it on and off on the Arduino, in some cases i want it open, and in other cases i want it closed.

so to open it normally you would just do Serial.begin(9600); and to close it it would be Serial.end(); but when using software serial somehow when i try to turn it off it doesn't work for example:

i use this part of the code to read the button by turning on the serial port and turning it back off whenever the button is released and to print out an "X" to make sure it is closed, that way i avoid that the serialport gets filled with characters:

     if (digitalRead(boton1) == HIGH)
     {
           Serial.begin(9600);
           Serial.print("A");
     }
     else
     {
           Serial.print("X");
           Serial.end();
     }

but when declaring a softwareserial:

SoftwareSerial Serial1(0,1);

     if (digitalRead(boton4) == HIGH)
     {
           Serial1.begin(4800);
           Serial1.print("L");
     }
     else
     {
           Serial1.print("X");
           Serial1.end();
     }

i test the code but it constantly keeps printing the "X" and its the exact same code but just with a softwareserial....

any suggestions?

Or you can do it an easier way. it's good practice to do as little as possible leaving the arduino free for other tasks.

Setup two globals to save the last button states and only send a serial message when the state changes. Something like this...

int myBtnState1;
int myBtnState4;

void setup()
{
  Serial1.begin(4800);
}

void loop()
{
 int currentState;


 //process button 4
 currentState = digitalRead(button4);
 if (currentState!=myBtnState4)
 {
    myBtnState4 = currentState
    if (myBtnState4 == HIGH)
     {
           Serial1.println("4:H");
     }
     else
     {
           Serial1.println("4:L");
     }
 } 

 //process button 1
 currentState = digitalRead(button1);
 if (currentState!=myBtnState1)
 {
    myBtnState1 = currentState
    if (myBtnState1 == HIGH)
     {
           Serial1.println("1:H");
     }
     else
     {
           Serial1.println("1:L");
     }
 } 
} 

The code above could be much less verbose, it is expanded for the purposed of this example.

It's also easier to use println() because then you can use the following c# to read the serial packet

String sIn = mySerialPort.ReadLine(); 

Using a separator for multiple data items in a packet is a good idea. the example above used a colon :

The c# to split the packet into an array is

String[] sPacketItems = sIn.Split(':'); 

So you can know in c# that button 4 is HIGH like this

String BtnId = sPacketItems[0];
String BtnState = sPacketItems[1];
if (BtnState=="H")
  MessageBox.Show(String.Format("Button {0} has been pressed",BtnId));
 

By the way you should not define SoftwareSerial as Serial1 because some arduino boards have numerous serial ports and Serial1 will certainly fail. 
If you switch board in the future you will have to rewrite your code. A good rule... Don't prefix softwareSerial variables with "Serial". "mySerial1" would work, or something that you like. 

Tim@Visual Micro wrote on Dec 2^nd, 2012 at 11:24pm:


That makes perfect sense.

ill give it another name and see how it works out. once again thank you for those codes  . you are like a programming guru hehehe XD.