-----------------------------------------------------------------
+-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
libserialport: cross-platform library for accessing serial ports
-----------------------------------------------------------------
+-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
libserialport is a minimal library written in C that is intended to take care
of the OS-specific details when writing software that uses serial ports.
The operations that are supported are:
- Port enumeration (obtaining a list of serial ports on the system).
+- Obtaining port metadata (USB device information, Bluetooth address, etc).
- Opening and closing ports.
- Setting port parameters (baud rate, parity, etc).
- Reading, writing and flushing data.
The library should build and work on any Windows or Unix-based system. If it
does not, please submit a bug.
-Enumeration is currently only implemented on Windows, Mac OS X and Linux. On
-other systems enumeration will return no results, but ports can still be opened
+Enumeration is currently implemented on Windows, Mac OS X, FreeBSD and Linux.
+On other systems enumeration is not supported, but ports can still be opened
by name and then used.
If you know how to enumerate available ports on another OS, please submit a bug
with this information, or better still a patch implementing it.
-Future
-======
-
-Future versions will add additional API calls for obtaining metadata about a
-port, e.g. for USB devices the USB VID and PID of the underlying device.
-
Dependencies
============
-On Linux, libudev is required. On other systems no other libraries are required.
-
-The libudev dependency could be eliminated in favour of direct sysfs queries at
-the cost of some brevity. This is not currently a priority but if you feel like
-doing this feel free to submit a patch.
+No other libraries are required.
Building
========
The package uses a GNU style build system and requires a Unix style shell.
-On Windows it can be built with the MinGW toolchain and MSYS environment.
+
+Windows builds can be created natively with the MinGW-w64 toolchain and
+MSYS2 environment, or cross-compiled using a MinGW-w64 toolchain:
+
+ http://mingw-w64.sourceforge.net/
+
+The "old" MinGW from http://mingw.org/ is not supported.
Run "./autogen.sh" to generate the build system, "./configure" to setup, then
"make" to build the library and "make install" to install it.
API
===
-The API is simple, and designed to be a minimal wrapper around the serial port
-support in each OS.
-
-Most functions take a pointer to a struct sp_port, which represents an open
-port. This structure should be allocated by the user and is populated by
-sp_open(). It can be freed safely after sp_close().
-
-All functions can return only three possible error values. SP_ERR_ARG indicates
-the function was called with invalid arguments. SP_ERR_FAIL indicates that the
-OS reported a failure. SP_ERR_MEM indicates that a memory allocation failed.
-Aoth these error values are negative.
-
-When SP_ERR_FAIL is returned, an error code or string description of the error
-can be obtained by calling sp_last_error_code() or sp_last_error_message(). The
-error code or message is that provided by the OS; libserialport does not define
-any error codes or messages of its own.
-
-Functions calls that succeed return SP_OK, which is equal to zero, or where
-otherwise documented a positive value.
-
-The available functions are as follows:
-
-Enumeration
------------
-
-char **sp_list_ports();
-
- Lists the serial ports available on the system. The value returned is an array
- of port names as C strings, terminated by a NULL. It should be freed after use
- by calling sp_free_port_list().
-
-void sp_free_port_list(char **list);
-
- Frees the data structure returned by sp_list_ports().
-
-Opening and closing ports
--------------------------
-
-int sp_open(struct sp_port *port, char *portname, int flags);
-
- Opens the specified serial port.
-
- Parameters:
-
- port: Pointer to empty port structure, allocated by caller.
- portname: Name of port to open.
- flags: Flags to use when opening the serial port. Possible
- flags are: SP_MODE_RDWR, SP_MODE_RDONLY, and SP_MODE_NONBLOCK.
-
- Returns: SP_OK on success, SP_ERR_FAIL on failure, or SP_ERR_ARG
- if an invalid port or name is passed.
-
-int sp_close(struct sp_port *port);
-
- Closes the specified serial port.
-
- Returns: SP_OK on success, SP_ERR_FAIL on failure, or SP_ERR_ARG
- if an invalid port is passed.
-
-Setting port parameters
------------------------
-
-int sp_set_params(struct sp_port *port, int baudrate,
- int bits, int parity, int stopbits,
- int flowcontrol, int rts, int dtr);
-
- Sets serial parameters for the specified serial port.
-
- Parameters:
-
- port: Pointer to port structure.
- baudrate: Baud rate to set.
- bits: Number of data bits to use.
- parity: Parity setting to use
- (SP_PARITY_NONE, SP_PARITY_EVEN or SP_PARITY_ODD)
- stopbits: Number of stop bits to use (1 or 2).
- flowcontrol: Flow control setting to use
- (SP_FLOW_NONE, SP_FLOW_HARDWARE or SP_FLOW_SOFTWARE)
-
- Returns: SP_OK on success, SP_ERR_FAIL on failure, or SP_ERR_ARG
- for invalid arguments.
-
-Reading, writing and flushing data
-----------------------------------
-
-int sp_read(struct sp_port *port, const void *buf, size_t count)
-
- Reads a number of bytes from the specified serial port.
-
- Parameters:
-
- port: Pointer to port structure.
- buf: Buffer in which to store the bytes read.
- count: Number of bytes to read.
-
- Returns: The number of bytes read, SP_ERR_FAIL on failure,
- or SP_ERR_ARG for invalid arguments.
-
-int sp_write(struct sp_port *port, const void *buf, size_t count)
-
- Writes a number of bytes to the specified serial port.
-
- Parameters:
-
- port: Pointer to port structure.
- buf: Buffer containing the bytes to write.
- count: Number of bytes to write.
-
- Returns: The number of bytes written, SP_ERR_FAIL on failure,
- or SP_ERR_ARG for invalid arguments.
-
-int sp_flush(struct sp_port *port);
-
- Flushes serial port buffers.
-
- Returns: SP_OK on success, SP_ERR_FAIL on failure, or SP_ERR_ARG
- if an invalid port is passed.
-
-Error handling
---------------
-
-int sp_last_error_code();
-
- Gets the error code for a failed operation.
-
- In order to obtain the correct result, this function should be called
- straight after the failure, before executing any other system operations.
-
- Returns: The system's numeric code for the error that caused the last
- operation to fail.
-
-char *sp_last_error_message();
+Doxygen API documentation is included.
- Gets the error message for failed operation.
+It can also be viewed online at:
- In order to obtain the correct result, this function should be called
- straight after the failure, before executing other system operations.
+ http://sigrok.org/api/libserialport/unstable/
- Returns: The system's message for the error that caused the last
- operation to fail. This string may be allocated by the function,
- and should be freed after use by calling sp_free_error_message.
+Website
+=======
-void sp_free_error_message(char *message);
+http://sigrok.org/wiki/Libserialport
- Frees the error message returned by sp_last_error_message().
projects / libserialport.git / blobdiff