PB4.20Beta & SerialPort commands

[Psychophanta]

Hi,

Serial ports are:
- SATA & SATA2
- USB
- Firewire IEEE 1394
- Telephone-Modem (commonly linked using RJ-11 connectors)
- Ethernet communication (commonly linked using RJ-45 connectors)
- RS-232, RS-422, etc. protocols are also serial communication based
- Audio signals (one per aplification line, i.e. one per speaker)
- etc.

So then, to call simply SerialPort to the commands of the RS232, RS422... serial communications PB library is in any case ambiguous, and IMHO erroneous.

[maw]

Historically serial ports have always been RS-232. Just because USB, Firewire and whatever use a serial protocol doesn't make them serial ports.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serial_port

Why do people actually go around trying to to find things to complain about?

[Psychophanta]

Ok, you are right,
Dunno, but perhaps in the opinion of the PB team, it would be a bit ugly to call it OpenUART(), UARTError(), UARTTimeouts(), AvailableUARTInput(), AvailableUARTOutput(), etc. even it would be more exact.
There seems to not have any other more correct way to call it.

[freak]

Everyone knows what a serial port is. Nobody would get the idea it could mean USB, because if you mean USB, you say USB

[SFSxOI]

Why the focus so much on serial ports in the day and age when serial ports are vanishing? I mean, for example, Windows Vista has already dropped support for a lot of serial port devices that were used in WindowsXP, and serial ports are vanishing on current motherboards.

USB and firewire support for devices are far more plentiful then they are for serial ports.

[leodh]

Hi,

Serial ports are the most common form of attaching devices to computers in industry, (especially science laboratories) also alot of home automation uses serial ports for control.

It would be a pitty to see support for them disapear.

[electrochrisso]

You can buy a USB to Serial DB9 Port Adapter for about $20.

[Berikco]

You can buy a USB to Serial DB9 Port Adapter for about $20.

And it goes with a driver that emulates a serial port

[dhouston]

You can buy a USB to Serial DB9 Port Adapter for about $20.

And it goes with a driver that emulates a serial port

Even the ones that only cost $9 have such virtual serial port drivers.

• http://www.byterunner.com/byterunner/pr ... atch=exact

Embedded devices seldom have enough horsepower to act as USB hosts so RS232 is unlikely to disappear anytime soon.

[robinhossain]

The serial port function is such an important addition to the PB command set. All labs and scientific work use serial data - as do microcontrollers and many chipsets.

The best serial port readers are very low level realtime readers that allow one to determine accurate timing analysis of data flow.