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Text File | 1992-08-20 | 19KB | 798 lines

LiteSPC VERSION 3.0 1 INTRODUCTION We originally designed LiteSPC, or just SPC, for use with modern telephone systems. Some modern phone systems can report call- related information to a serial port. This capability is important to organizations that charge for telephone usage or monitor telephone usage. In many cases, a dedicated printer records the information as the telephone system produces it. Company personnel scan the reports at a later time to develop billing or usage information. This is particularly true of smaller hotels, motels and inns. But the approach is not without problems. The transcription of the printed material is time-consuming. Under some circumstances, the information is not available quickly enough to insure accuracy. That is why some lodging establishments have to ask whether you made telephone call just before checking-out; they have to rely on your honesty. And, to be sure, any operation that is labor-intensive is expensive. Finally, the transcription may introduce errors. Think of the last time your room bill included phone charges for calls you never made. Or think of the last time your department was cautioned about abuse of company telephones, when no abuse existed. This is where SPC can be value. SPC runs as a Terminate and Stay Resident (TSR) program. It dutifully records, on the computers disk, any information that arrives at the system's serial port. The same information is instantly available for billing or analysis purposes. And all of this without human intervention or transcription errors. Since its introduction, SPC has been used for applications beyond its original purpose. A host of devices beyond telephone systems produce information in serial form. These devices can be found in all types of environments ranging from the office to the manufacturing floor. And for good reason. Engineers have recognized that information of all types is a useful by-product of many other functions. Implementing the capture of this information with a serial device is inexpensive and a product salable feature. For example, picture a modern production line. The finished product moves on a conveyer to a scale that weighs the product. If the scale detects an underweight or overweight product, it sends information by a serial link warning of the condition. If the product is within normal limits, a different serial message is sent. Products that are not within the normal weight profile are automatically removed from the line. Products that pass successfully are branded with the correct weight for shipping purposes. LiteSPC Version 3.0 This scenario is not imaginary. One SPC user has implemented just such a system for a client company. And the 'branding' machine also produces serial information that is recorded by a second copy of SPC. The changes that have gone into SPC version 3 are the results of feedback received from that user. 2 FEATURES OF LiteSPC 3.0 The original version of SPC could monitor a single serial port. Thanks to some custom modifications that we made, we were able to run a second, independent copy of SPC for the user we mentioned above. But this approach took too much valuable system memory. SPC version 1 required approximately 25 KB of memory to run. The customized version took exactly twice that amount of memory when both copies were running. SPC version 3 remedies this situation. Version 3 can monitor and record information from both COM1 and COM2 simultaneously. The information is stored in two independent log files for later use. SPC accomplishes this in somewhat less than 28 KB. And version 3 fully supports the 16550 UART. If your system uses this type of device, SPC will automatically recognize and activate it. The result will be less likelihood of lost data, particularly at higher baud rates. And since some software still relies on the existence of a CTRL-Z character to mark the end of a text file, SPC always places a CTRL-Z at the end of its log files. o It is highly configurable by the user. o It can use either hardware or software flow control. o It can run in a network environment. o And most important of all, it does all of this while you continue to use your system for other purposes. Think about it. Now you can capture that valuable information without the cost, time, and problems associated with transcription. And SPC can provide an easy link to other applications, written in any language, that can read a file but don't have communications capability. SPC's uses are limited only by your imagination. 3 INSTALLING SPC A successful implementation of LiteSPC consists of copying the SPC.EXE file into an appropriate subdirectory using the DOS COPY command. And before using SPC, you must create a configuration Copyright (c) 1991-1992, Information Technology, Ltd. 2 LiteSPC Version 3.0 file using any standard ASCII text editor; but more about this later. That's all there is to it. SPC will be ready for use before you know it. 4 CREATING THE CONFIGURATION FILE SPC, when loading, will attempt to open and read a file called SPC.CFG. The information in SPC.CFG determines how SPC will function once it is loaded. You create the configuration file using any ASCII text editor. The parameters are simple to understand and to use. We have reproduced, in figure 1, the sample configuration file distributed with SPC. PORT=2 Log=spm2.log baud=2400 parity=n eor=^M^J PORT=1 Log=spm1.log baud=2400 parity=n eor=^M^J Figure 1: Sample SPC.CFG parameters Each parameter consists of a keyword followed by an '=' sign, followed by the value of the parameter itself. All parameters must conform to the same general set of rules, summarized in the table below. Copyright (c) 1991-1992, Information Technology, Ltd. 3 LiteSPC Version 3.0 Table 1: Parameter Rules o You may use only 1 parameter to a line, and the parameter must be complete on that line. o Keywords may be in either lower or upper case, or in mixed case. o The use of spaces before and after the equal sign are optional and may improve readability. o You may not embed spaces in either the keywords, or in the parameter values. o The sequence of parameters in unimportant, with the exception of the PORT parameter. SPC assumes that the parameter values encountered apply to the most recently defined port. Therefore the first parameter in SPC.CFG must be a PORT parameter. o You only need define parameters for a single port if you application requires a single port. Unless defined in the configuration file, a port will NOT be used by SPC. 5 PARAMETER VALUES It is important that you understand each of the parameters and how they are used. For the most part, their usage is straightforward. PORT- The PORT parameter must precede the parameters for that port, and must be the first parameter SPC encounters. PORT may have a parameter value of either 1 or 2. The port parameter remains in effect until the next PORT parameter is encountered. BAUD- The BAUD parameter specifies the baud rate at which the currently defined port will run. Any numeric value is acceptable, although the most common baud rates are 300, 600, 1200, 2400, 4800, 9600, 19200, 38400, and 57600. We cannot guarantee proper operation of SPC at baud rates above 57600 unless your system uses the 16550 UART. See the notes and warnings section below. PARITY- Valid values for the PARITY parameter are N(No Parity), E(Even Parity), O(Odd Parity), M(Mark Parity), and S(Space Parity). Please note that there is no specification for DATABITS. SPC automatically configures the number of data bits based upon the PARITY parameter, so that the sum of the data bits plus the parity bit always equals 8. Copyright (c) 1991-1992, Information Technology, Ltd. 4 LiteSPC Version 3.0 EOR- SPC writes data to its log file(s) when either the EOR (end of record) string is encountered, or when its internal buffer fills, whichever occurs first. Even though you specify an EOR string, SPC will never lose information. The EOR parameter simply insures that the log file contains complete records at any point in time. EOR defaults to a CR-LF (carriage return, line feed) sequence. To specify a new string, type the new character string, up to 5 characters in length. Unprintable characters are specified as a control sequence, using a carat (^) as shown in figure 1. Figure 1 specifies CR-LF as the EOR string. For example, to use escape as one of the characters, you would specify ^]. You may use any set of 5 characters, with the exception of NULL or any of the extended ASCII characters. LOG- Although SPC uses default names of SPC1.LOG and SPC2.LOG for COM1 and COM2 respectively, you may wish to use other names, or place the log file in other than the default directory. If you wish to specify a different name or path, use the LOG parameter and specify a new name, following normal file naming conventions. 6 COMMAND LINE ARGUMENTS Version 3 of SPC uses a minimum of command line arguments. Command line arguments are preceded by a dash (-), and may be either lower or upper case. The general form of the command line is: SPC [-a] [-f1<pathname>] [-f2<pathname>] [-u] -a (audible). Valid only when initially loading SPC. Produce an pleasing audible tone whenever SPC logs information, regardless of the ports in use. -f1<pathname> -f2<pathname> These arguments allow you to rename the current log file for port 1 (-f1) and port 2 (-f2) while SPC is loaded and running. The current log file will be renamed to the name you specify, and a new log file will be created when SPC has to log information. Please bear in mind that if you rename the log file in this manner that it is your responsibility to remove the renamed file. Copyright (c) 1991-1992, Information Technology, Ltd. 5 LiteSPC Version 3.0 -u (unload). Valid only when SPC is loaded. Forces SPC to dump any remaining information to the log file, terminate, and release its memory. SPC will not accept incorrect combinations of command line arguments. If SPC detects an error, it will display a usage message and terminate immediately. 7 NOTES AND WARNINGS 1. SPC will support baud rates up to 115200 baud. However, your success at higher speeds depends, in part, on your particular system. Do not, for example, expect a PC-XT class system to perform well at baud rates above 9600. 2. When SPC logs information to its log file, you may experience a momentary delay in what you are doing on your system. This is most noticeable if you are typing at the keyboard. It may appear that, for a brief time, the characters you are typing are not being recognized. BE PATIENT, they will appear. This delay is expected and should not be cause for concern. 3. If you are using SPC to monitor 1 or more ports with very high activity, it is possible that your system may appear to lock up. This is because SPC activates any time that it recognizes incoming information. To free the system, you must remove or disable the source of the information. To avoid this problem, operate SPC at a lower baud rate, if possible, or attempt to adjust the sending rate of the device(s) that SPC is monitoring. 4. If you are using SPC to monitor 2 ports, it will perform best if both ports are operating at the same speed. If you cannot adjust the speed of the sending devices to create a balanced situation, we recommend that the higher speed device be connected to COM2. By using this approach, you will guarantee that SPC will always service COM1 and COM2 in that order, lessening that chance of information from the slower device being lost. 5. If you have multiple TSR's loaded on your system, SPC will NOT unload until any TSR's loaded after SPC have been unloaded. If you attempt to unload SPC with other TSR's loaded, SPC will cease to capture information, but it will not remove itself from memory until the time is right. Copyright (c) 1991-1992, Information Technology, Ltd. 6 LiteSPC Version 3.0 Index B M baud 6 memory 2 baud rate 4 P C parity 4 configuration file 3 port 1, 2, 4 control sequence 5 COPY 2 R CTRL-Z 2 rename 5 rules 3 D delay 6 S device 6 sequence 4 serial 1 K spaces 4 keyword 3 SPC.CFG 3 L T lock up 6 telephone 1 log 2, 5, 6 text editor 3 log file 5 TSR 1, 6 Copyright (c) 1991-1992, Information Technology, Ltd. 7 Contents 1 INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 2 FEATURES OF LiteSPC 3.0 . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 3 INSTALLING SPC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 4 CREATING THE CONFIGURATION FILE . . . . . . . . 3 5 PARAMETER VALUES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 6 COMMAND LINE ARGUMENTS . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 7 NOTES AND WARNINGS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Index 7 i ii Figures Figure 1: Sample SPC.CFG parameters . . . . . . . . . 3 iii iv Tables Table 1: Parameter Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 v