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I have a device connected to my computer via RS232 to USB. This device hold times for eight tanning beds. I want to get the data from the pins on the serial port to see how it is connecting with the device, to see how the times are being displayed. I am hoping to do this is C#, but I'm not sure exactly where I need to start. I have thought about probing the pins on an oscilloscope, but that seems very tedious. Any thoughts?

dsolimano
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Matt
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  • I would start with reading this post http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2594519/access-usb-or-serial-in-c-sharp – Micah Armantrout Feb 20 '12 at 02:14
  • Are you trying to eavesdrop on a running program to see what it is communicating with the beds or are you trying to talk to the bed directly? – Scott Chamberlain Feb 20 '12 at 04:15
  • Well, my ultimate goal is to take the data (tanning bed times) that is being sent and received, and display it on web page for customers to see. So, I guess I would be eavesdropping on the running program, to see how the data is being sent back and forth, so i can upload it to a webpage. – Matt Feb 20 '12 at 17:38
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    Have you contacted the manufacturer of the beds and asked them for the comms documentation? The worst they can do is say no. – Jason Williams Feb 20 '12 at 19:55

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I just ran in to this my self. If you are not using a 64 bit version of windows I would recommend using PortMon, save the log file, then do offline parsing of your log file. There are libraries that let you hook in to the stream via code but I think using PortMon you may not even need to write any code at all and you may be able to just figure out the protocol by visual inspection.

If you are using a 64 bit version of windows your choices are severely limited. I could not find a free program that was compatible with windows 7 x64, The only program I heard that works (but I did not buy it and the free version did not work) is Serial Port Monitor by HHD.

You can also try running the software in XP Mode to get the 32 bit monitoring programs running, it worked for me.

Community
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Scott Chamberlain
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