G5 Upgrade and advice please

[robertmyhtpc]

Ok, after years of happy times, I have retired my G3 install. Machine died.

I have been playing with 4 and my experience has been difficult in implementing the serial devices. 3 was easier in my mind or with my aptitude.

I have decided to drop my beloved Meedio front end-Media and Automation and gone to Vista Ultimate. In order to get the front end, I guess my only option is to go to the HAI omni and buy the Media Center plugin and have the controller broker the commands and automation. G4 did not well with the usbuirt so I downloaded G5 and it works fine with media center. So, here are my questions

What version do I need, Standard or Pro? I want serial and usbuirt io.
Will serial plugins from 4 and 5 be ineroperable?
What is the function of the omni plug in?

Thanks

[Rob H]

I think G5 Standard includes the serial support, but I'm not 100% sure - I'd wait for Ron's confirmation before you buy.

There should be no problems with interoperability of serial devices between G4 and G5 - at least nothing that can't be fixed with a minor edit of the device's Lua file (the one obvious change is that the semantics of the receive terminator string are different in G5 - in G4 a string of e.g. /r/n would match either a carriage return OR a linefeed, whereas in G5 /r/n only matches a carriage return followed by a linefeed)

The Omni plugin allows you access to and control of a HAI Omni security controller.

[jmonier]

I'm pretty sure that serial is only available with the Professional version in G5 just like G4. Implementing serial in G4 IS a lot more difficult than in G3 (unless your device is available in the Downloads section). It's no longer a matter of filling in a form, you have to do LUA programming (although there are plenty of examples available). Mine migrated from G4 to G5 with no problems.

[Rob H]

I've attached my Serial Device Maker - the xml file goes in plugins\UI and the Lua file in plugins\treescript.

This adds a Serial Device Maker action to the Girder's Actions pane - drag this to your GML and it will give you a form you can fill in with the various settings. Clear the Lua console first then press the Generate button and it will produce a listing for a serial device. Select this and copy to the clipboard then paste it into a .lua file in plugins\serial and reset Girder and the serial device should be available.

Works with either G4 or G5.

[jmonier]

I just noticed this as well. It already exists in G5. It does get you past the hardest part of the learning curve.

[Rob H]

Ah good, I wasn't sure if Ron had included it in the released version.

Actually, you should really use the updated .lua file rather than the supplied one as it corrects the bug where the ReceiveResponse method uses


if math.band(code, serial.RXCHAR) then

rather than


if math.band(code, serial.RXCHAR) > 0 then

[robertmyhtpc]

thanks for the help!

[robertmyhtpc]

Rob,
Sorry, but where will the file end up? I filled out the form and generate, but dont see where the file is displayed. It does not display in the interactive scripting console.
Thanks

[Rob H]

As I said earlier, clear the Lua console then press the Generate button. The text will appear in the console, so you just copy it from there to a file in e.g. Notepad.