Serial port help

Hi everyone

I could use some pointer on serial port programming. I haven’t done any hardware type programming as of yet. I have a Heidenhain Length gauge. It uses photoelectric linear encoders. This instrument has a digital readout with a RS232 output line. I’m looking to get the Value off the digital readout and bring it into my program.

I have put a mscomm32.ocx onto my application. I’ve been reading up on serial port stuff.

I have the input mode set to text because when it is set to binary i get nothing!

Code
Private Sub cmdHeidenhain_Click()
' Open the serial port
MSComm1.CommPort = 1

MSComm1.Settings = "9600,N,7,2"

MSComm1.PortOpen = True

' Tell the control to read entire buffer when Input is used.
MSComm1.InputLen = 0


If MSComm1.PortOpen Then
' Send the keystroke to the port.

' Now " Ctrl + B" to Buffer

MSComm1.Output = Chr$(2)
aaa = MSComm1.Input
Text1.Text = aaa


' I get a value here in the MSComm1.Input of
' -.37184 and three square boxes
' but i cannot assign it to my variable Text1
' This is my text box


' Unless Echo is on, there is no need to
' let the text control display the key.
' A modem usually echos back a character
If Not Echo Then
' Place position at end of terminal
txtTerm.SelStart = Len(txtTerm)
End If
End If

MSComm1.PortOpen = False
End Sub



Thanks for any help

reston

Quote:

---

' I get a value here in the MSComm1.Input of
' -.37184 and three square boxes
' but i cannot assign it to my variable Text1

---

The 3 square boxs are values that come back and are not "text" they may be ACK or NACK or EOF type characters. You should look at the ASCII value of them to figure out what to do with them.

Quote:

---

' This is my text box

---

Notihing came out after this...is your text box empty???:confused:

Regarding the ECHO thing...i'm a bit confused about your question.
kevin

To go along with what KEBO said - those characters are non-printable.

You should really design a display on your form that shows the value received a bit differently.

Let's say you get -.34532xxx (the xxx represents the unprintable chr's).

You should display more like this at first, while developing:


-.34532xxx
LEN=10
C1="-" (asc=45)
C2="." (asc=46)
C3="3" (asc=51)
.
.
.
C8="x" (asc=13)
C9="x" (asc=10)
C10="x" (asc=0)


For instance.

Hi You guys

I'm not interested in the square box’s after the value. I want to strip the value out of that string in the mscomm.input. If my program is running and i have a break point set, i can hover my mouse over the msComm.input and see what is being returned from the gauge. But i can not capture the value.

reston

You are not interested in the square boxes after the input?

Knowing what they are means you can do an INSTR for them and cut them off...

Whatever...

I'm not sure stripping the characters can be done. I can not create a variable out of what i get.

Thanks for the help though

I will try and strip those characters off

Reston

If you find out they are CHR(13)+CHR(10)+CHR(0) then you know they are end-of-line sequence from old-style equipment.

So test if RIGHT(strVbl,3)=Chr(13)+Chr(10)+Chr(0) then...

But if it's not, then get familiar with what the ASCII values are of those unprintable characters...

Good luck :)