UART Wildcard User Guide

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Demo Illustrates Initialization and Revectoring of Serial I/O

The demonstration program presents constants and functions that illustrate how to use the serial channels. The function named Default_UART_Init accepts a Wildcard number parameter, and initializes both serial channels to default values specified by the constants DEFAULT_BITS_PER_CHAR, DEFAULT_STOP_BITS, DEFAULT_PARITY, DEFAULT_BAUDRATE, DEFAULT_PROTOCOL, and DEFAULT_MODEM_SUPPORT. The values of these constants can be edited, and a more versatile initialization function can be crafted to meet the needs of your application.

The multitasking operating system on the Mosaic controller allows each task to access its own distinct serial I/O channel by pointing the three primitives Emit, Ask_Key (called ?KEY in Forth), and Key to the desired serial I/O handler functions. The advantage of revectoring is that higher level serial management functions that accept and print characters and strings will then use the designated serial channel. The Ch1_Monitor and Ch2_Monitor functions in the demonstration perform the revectoring, and then call functions that perform interactive echoing via the specified serial channel on the UART Wildcard. The Run_Demo function (or the main function in C) starts and runs the multitasking demonstration using both channels of the UART Wildcard. The demonstration program source code is presented in a later section.

Installing the UART Wildcard Driver Software

The UART Wildcard device driver software is provided as a pre-coded modular runtime library, known as a "kernel extension" because it enhances the on-board kernel's capabilities. The library functions are accessible from C and Forth.

Mosaic Industries can provide you with a web site link that will enable you to create a packaged kernel extension that has drivers for all of the hardware that you have on your system. In this way the software drivers are customized to your needs, and you can generate whatever combination of drivers you need. Make sure to specify the UART Wildcard Drivers in the list of kernel extensions you want to generate, and download the resulting "packages.zip" file to your hard drive.

For convenience, a separate pre-generated kernel extension for the UART Wildcard is available from Mosaic Industries on the Demo and Drivers media (diskette or CD). Look in the Drivers directory, in the subdirectory corresponding to your hardware (the Mosaic Controller of your choice), in the UART_Wildcard folder.

The kernel extension is shipped as a "zipped" file named "packages.zip". Unzipping it (using, for example, winzip or pkzip) extracts the following files:

• readme.txt - Provides summary documentation about the library.
• install.txt - The installation file, to be loaded to COLD-started Mosaic Controller.
• library.4th - Forth name headers and utilities; prepend to Forth programs.
• library.c - C callers for all functions in library; #include in C code.
• library.h - C prototypes for all functions; #include in extra C files.

Library.c and library.h are only needed if you are programming in C. Library.4th is only needed if you are programming in Forth. The uses of all of these files are explained below.

We recommend that you move the relevant files to the same directory that contains your application source code.

To use the kernel extension, the runtime kernel extension code contained in the install.txt file must first be loaded into the flash memory of the Mosaic Controller. Start the Terminal software with the Mosaic Controller connected to the serial port and turned on. If you have not yet tested your Mosaic Controller and terminal software, please refer to the documentation provided with the Terminal software. Once you can hit enter and see the 'ok' prompt returned in the terminal window, type

COLD

Now, type

COLD

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