hey, guys... I need some help, here

I am currently working for a university, trying to program in Perl/Tk a gui that will control this device.

Now the problem: I can't figure out, for the life of me, how to send commands directly through the serial port. The device that I'm programming for takes as input a string (for example "p" for pressure) and it's supposed to return a string that will tell the setting that it's at (eg, ABCDeE FHGIeJ)

ABCD-is a multiplier, and E is the exponent
FHGJ- is a multiplier, and J is the exponent


so when I send "p" I am supposed to get letters like that back... then I need to program to interpret them... that's not the hard part, getting it to take the input and spill back output IS the hard part.

First off, is there any way that I can echo or print or something directly to the device, through serial (just one letter, or so). Second, is there a way that I can get it's response back (even if only to the terminal window). Thirdly, how do I do it?. Lastly, Please Keep it simple.... i'm quite new to this...


*edit* by the way - in case you didn't know, it is RS-232 serial port through a 15-pin D-sub connector (9 pin serial on computer, 15-pin serial on device

To test the device you can use minicom or

http://sourceforge.net/projects/gcomm/

I found a perl program for testing the serial port that probably could be adapted.
http://ftdi-usb-sio.sourceforge.net/#3

Nalorin,

Other than using Minicom (et al.) to communicate directly to the device, what did you find to be the best way to send & receive data directly through the port ? Echoing text to the port works, but a bit unreliably methinks.

We are doing something similar at our university with a remote device hooked up to a GPRS terminal.

Cheers,

mj