You might have a .NET Micro Framework Application that uses serial COM Ports and is running on an MF emulator. How nice would it be to see the serial output on Hyper-Terminal or provide input data via Hyper-Terminal. Yes that's possible, you do not have to leave the managed world to do that!
It is really amazing how extensible the .NET Micro Framework Extensible Emulator is. Luckily Hyper-Terminal is able to make connections via TCP/IP sockets. With sockets we can loop back data on one PC without needing virtual COM port drivers. Therefore I wrote a custom Serial Port Emulator Component called ComPortToServerSocket to bring the serial data to sockets. The component is placed in library assembly (dll) and can be used on any emulator. You just have to place the shared assembly in the same directory as your emulator and add the following lines to your emulator configuration.
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<Emulator>
<Types>
<SocketCom>Kuehner.SPOT.Emulator.ComPortToServerSocket, ComPortToSocketComponent</SocketCom>
</Types>
<EmulatorComponents>
<SocketCom>
<ComPortHandle>Usart1</ComPortHandle>
<!--optional-->
<ClientIpAddress>127.0.0.1</ClientIpAddress>
<IpPort>23</IpPort>
<ShowWaitMessage>true</ShowWaitMessage>
</SocketCom>
</EmulatorComponents>
</Emulator>
When the emulated MF app opens the COM-Port, a message box occurs and you need to make a TCP/IP connection on 12.0.0.1 at the specified port with Hyper-Terminal, press OK and then you go.
The source code for the component is here:
using System;
using Microsoft.SPOT.Emulator.Com;
using System.Net.Sockets;
using System.Net;
using System.Windows.Forms;
namespace Kuehner.SPOT.Emulator
{
public class ComPortToServerSocket : ComPortToStream
{
private Socket serverSocket;
private IPAddress clientIpAddress = IPAddress.Loopback;
private int ipPort = 23;
private bool showWaitMessage = true;
protected override void InitializeProtected()
{
base.InitializeProtected();
if (this.Stream == null)
{
this.serverSocket = new Socket(AddressFamily.InterNetwork,
SocketType.Stream,
ProtocolType.Tcp);
this.serverSocket.Bind(new IPEndPoint(this.clientIpAddress, this.ipPort));
this.serverSocket.Listen(1);
string message = string.Format(null,
"The component {0} is waiting for a client to connect at port {1} for COM{2}.",
this.ComponentId,
this.ipPort,
this.ComPortHandle.PortNumber);
System.Diagnostics.Trace.WriteLine(message);
if (this.showWaitMessage)
{
MessageBox.Show(message,
"ComPortToSocketServer Component waiting at Port " + this.ipPort,
MessageBoxButtons.OK);
}
//the emulator will block until a client eg. HyperTerm connects
Socket clientSocket = this.serverSocket.Accept();
this.Stream = new NetworkStream(clientSocket, true);
}
}
protected override void UninitializeProtected()
{
base.UninitializeProtected();
if (this.Stream != null)
{
this.serverSocket.Close();
this.serverSocket = null;
this.Stream = null;
}
}
#region properties
public IPAddress ClientIpAddress
{
get { return this.clientIpAddress; }
set { this.clientIpAddress = value; }
}
public int IpPort
{
get { return this.ipPort; }
set { this.ipPort = value; }
}
public bool ShowWaitMessage
{
get { return this.showWaitMessage; }
set { this.showWaitMessage = value; }
}
#endregion
}
}