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Connect A Local Device to A Remote Server

By allankliu
Created 14/07/2008 - 05:28

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As I mentioned in the resource book of EE Software [1], the JavaScript code can connect to the
local serial port. The JavaScript is officially not allowed to access any local resources but the
web browser.

JavaScript and ActiveX

ActiveXperts.com offers serial communication

software components for a bundle of languages,
including HTML/JavaScript. I visited its FAQ page
for HTML/JavaScript integration. The software
component - ActiveComport, is a DLL for Windows.
When user visits the web page, the DLL will try to
download to the user's local drive, i.e. system
folder. IE can fully support this feature via ActiveX
object. But IE is disgraced for the easy to infect by
viruses and Trojans and its flexibility. And it is not a
cross-platform solution, at least not working for
Safari and Opera. I am not sure about the Firefox
yet. And definitely it does not support Linux OS.
And installation ActiveComport.dll will prompt the
users to change the security rules in IE...... Anyway,
this approach is not a general purpose solution.

We can find the similar solution from Garmin, which

is a leading GPS supplier. It offers a browser
plug-in for IE/Firefox to allow Garmin GPS to
connect to the web page. The users can upload
and download POI, GPX file. It is really a good
idea, since Web GIS and GPS device can connect
to each other without installation dedicated
software. However the users must download and

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Connect A Local Device to A Remote Server http://dev.emcelettronica.com/print/51837

install browser plug-in anyway. I am not sure about

how Garmin solve it. But I believe it should be similar with ActiveXperts' solution.

I also survey the Java Applet connection to serial port. The system requires a certificate for such
Applet, the code can have a fake certificate, but the system will prompt the users that the Applet
is suspicious and untrustworthy.

Alternative Solution with Local Web Server

It is a trend to integrate web service

and local device via web widget or
web page. We can achieve the goal
with general technologies, without
breaking browser's security rules
and confusing end users. It is very
important when the device is
designed for regular consumers,
instead of geeks.

The solution is local web server. The

web server is located in every
computer. Either Windows or Linux
PC can active the local web server
easily. There are so many light
weight server available everywhere,
which the users can download and
run it without installation. While
server side script languages are free
to connect to any local devices via
serial port, Bluetooth and USB. The
candidate script languages could be
PHP, Python, Perl, and JSP.

In this approach, there are two

servers actually. One local server
connects to local resource and device, the user is operated via web page from local server and
remote server, the local server will exchange data with remote server. The approach is working
independently on any OS and any browser.

Here is a sample PHP code connects to the serial port. You can easily change the PHP code to
meet your demand. However, please don't embed the serial communication module into final
PHP web page as user UI part. We must remind that serial communication is a slow
asynchronous data communication between two entities, while web is state-less communication
method. And PHP code can not run forever to wait for a data, it has own timeout limitation. So it

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Connect A Local Device to A Remote Server http://dev.emcelettronica.com/print/51837

is better to cache the two way communication datum in a "buffer" even in a fast local connection.
Otherwise the user will find the page halts very often. It is a bad user experience, they will give
up finally.

<?php
include "php_serial.class.php";
// Let's start the class
$serial = new phpSerial;
// First we must specify the device. This works on both linux and windows (if
// your linux serial device is /dev/ttyS0 for COM1, etc)
$serial->deviceSet("COM1");
// Then we need to open it
$serial->deviceOpen();
// To write into
$serial->sendMessage("Hello !");
// Or to read from
$read = $serial->readPort();
// If you want to change the configuration, the device must be closed
$serial->deviceClose();
// We can change the baud rate
$serial->confBaudRate(2400);
// etc...
?>

I believe that the connection between the web services and the local devices will be more and
more popular. Hopefully we can find more efficient methods to meet the design challenge.

Reference

The Garmin Communicator Plug-in is an exciting new software

program that transfers data between websites and Garmin GPS
Devices. The Garmin Communicator Plug-in API allows
developers to integrate the Communicator Plug-in into any
website.

The API is a JavaScript library that provides user interface

components that will transfer GPS data between a website and a
[2] Garmin device. The result is a toolkit that can connect any
website’s visitors to Garmin devices with very little development
effort.

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Connect A Local Device to A Remote Server http://dev.emcelettronica.com/print/51837

Using ActiveComport Serial Port Toolkit with HTML forms on a

client PC

[3]

FAQ for HTML and Javascript projects of ActiveXperts serial

communication.

[4]

Trademarks

Source URL: http://dev.emcelettronica.com/connect-local-device-remote-server

Links:
[1] http://dev.emcelettronica.com/ee-software-development
[2] http://developer.garmin.com/web-device/garmin-communicator-plugin/
[3] http://www.activexperts.com/activcomport/howto/html/
[4] http://www.activexperts.com/support/kb/index.asp?ProductCode=003&IDCategory=325

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