Serial Port Terminal Program

[Vincent Trouilliez]

On Fri, 27 Feb 2009 11:45:04 -0600
Kipton Moravec <kip at kdream.com> wrote:

> I am using GtkTerm and streaming data off and on at 19200 baud, and it
> is losing data. There is no hand shaking hardware or software. (It is
> custom HW I am developing and testing.)
> 
> Is there a better terminal program that does not lose data at that
> relatively slow speed? (I have also seen it lose data at 9600 baud.) I
> am trying to capture the data to a file for review later.


What a coincidence !
I am also using Gtkterm to debug the UART routines of the embedded
hardware I am working on (Atmel AVR chip, UART at 8192 Bauds). I have
been banging my head on the wall because I noticed that when I send a 14
byte data frame to Gtkterm, somehow 3 bytes in the frame, always at the
same place in the frame, are not received properly by gtkterm... but
when sending shorter frames (3 or 4 bytes), it works fine.
I thought (logically!) that my hardware was at fault, but I am not so
sure now, because "sniffing" the UART with a custom made hardware
terminal, I get no errors ! Thanks to your post, I can now stop
worrying about my hardware and just consider the possibility that
Gtkterm is somehow not receiving the data correctly (and just leave with
it) !

> I may have to go back to a DOS program, or Hyper Terminal on XP. 

You may well have to indeed. Gtkterm is the only "hyperterminal"
equivalent I found on Linux. The other terminal program everybody
repeatedly suggests me is "minicom", but it's a major PITA to use, as
it's meant to emulate a "real" terminal, so it's way to complex and
overkill, and not as practical as gtkterm, for the needs of debugging an
embedded system.

But your idea is great... I will just use my WinXP virtual machine to
run hyperterminal to confirm that my hardware works fine and that it's
indeed Gtkterm that's faulty. 
I don't know of any hyperterminal-like program for MS-DOS, if you do
please share with me ;-)


--
Vince