New software application

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Adam Anderson

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Feb 5, 2007, 2:53:33 AM2/5/07

to Serial Communications

Recently I was in the situation of having to test a Point to Point
link, lets call them Point A and Point B.
The client needed verification that the installed IEC485 to Fibre
Optic media converters where working as specified in the Project
Specifications.

The link was a single link with Point A 300 meters away from Point B.
As the equipment was installed I could not simply loop from COM1 to
COM2 on the same PC. Normally this is how I perform a Functional
Acceptance Test (F.A.T.). Nor could I simply connect the TX pin to the
RX pin at the remote end as I would have done if they where IEC232
protocol media converters.
The only real solution was two laptops with 485 media converters and
Hyper Terminal, so I had to abandon using my Serial Communications
Link Analyser. This made me quite sad so I've decided to develop a new
version of the software that supports a Single Port Test Mode and also
another software tool that is simply an echo program.

So Point A has my laptop with SCLA installed and running in Single
Port Test Mode, Point B has a laptop with the Echo Software installed.

This will help enable the SCLA software to test serial links in almost
any configuration.

As a further note on the project I was involved in, the media
converters tested fine the problem was the equipment the IEC485
devices where communicating with. The devices supplied by another
vendor where not compatible with the IEC485 standard (the vendors
equipment implemented a 1V offset). I guess if they had done a F.A.T.
they would have picked this up.