Scripting tools under Windows

Alf wrote:
>
>Like a lot of you I develop devices that need to be programmed, 
>configured and tested in a production environment, often in conjunction 
>with firmware test functions on the embedded device.  Much of this is 
>accomplished from Windows PCs using serial and parallel ports and 
>usually involves running small utility programs.  Naturally I want to 
>script these procedures to require the minimum amount of human 
>intervention, both for efficiencey and repeatability.
>
>Years ago, I used QuickBasic to quickly knock up this sort of script, 
>usually 1/2 an hour at most, a nice set of serial and parallel port 
>manipulation tools and easy to run little external apps (e.g. a bin2hex 
>utility).  Of course QuickBasic is not compatible with modern Microsoft 
>OS's.
>
>My preference is for a simple language that does not have to produce 
>robust shrink-wrap code, isn't bloated with GUI stuff, has serial comms 
>with control over handshake lines, can control parallel port lines, can 
>send data to other apps and receive data from them, read and write files 
>and interact with the user via a console, and can be batched.  It should 
>be capable of being modified by Windows programmers, embedded 
>programmers, hardware engineers and production techs without too much of 
>a learning curve - kind of leaves out huge APIs and frameworks.

PowerBASIC Command Console matches your description. (Make sure 
that PowerBASIC Command Console is the one you look at; there is 
another flavor of PowerBASIC that is more suited for GUI work 
-- you want PC/CC.) 

Please keep in mind that only Windows 3.x, 95, 98, and Me can read 
and write directly to the parallel port.  For 2000, 2003, and XP,
unless your chosen language contains a driver (not likely) you 
will need a driver such as:

ParaPort: http://www.paraport.net/documentation/index.html
PortTalk: http://www.beyondlogic.org/porttalk/porttalk.htm
ParPort 2004: http://www.zeecube.com/ParPort2004.htm
TVicPort: http://www.entechtaiwan.com/dev/port/index.shtm
WinIO: http://www.internals.com/
ParIO: http://www.pcjunkie.cwc.net/
Also see: http://www.lvr.com/parport.htm#Programming

I don't know if any of the above work on Vista. If you 
are using Vista to interface with embedded systems in a 
production environment, you need a brain transplant, 
not a programming langueage or device driver. :)


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Alf wrote:
>     So what scripting tools are you guys using out there?

Unix tools, like the gods intended... ;->  Cygwin works quite well once 
you've wrapped your head around its quirks.

I usually escalate from bash to sed, to awk to perl, as needed.

>     Years ago, I used QuickBasic to quickly knock up this sort of 
> script, usually 1/2 an hour at most, a nice set of serial and parallel 
> port manipulation tools and easy to run little external apps (e.g. a 
> bin2hex utility).  Of course QuickBasic is not compatible with modern 
> Microsoft OS's.

There's VisualBasic and, more importantly, the Windows Scripting Host, 
which runs scripts written in either Basis or JScript.  That's pretty 
much the official solution if you're on MS Windows.

Alf wrote:
>     So what scripting tools are you guys using out there?

Ruby, see www.ruby-lang.org

David Brown wrote:
> I've read a fair number of different descriptions of different languages 
> over the years, but I've never seen anything as totally inaccurate as that!
> 
> Python adds language features over *years*, not weeks - and it does so 
> with a very structured and safe system of deprecating old features (when 
> absolutely necessary) and gradually introducing new ones.
> 
Whoops, I really wasn't trying to troll for Serpentophiles, sorry.
> tcl/tk would be another alternative to consider if you have some sort of 
> snake allergy.
> 
There's one I'd completely forgotten about, must look it up again, been 
many years since I dallied with it.

Thanks,
Alf

David Brown wrote:
> Stephen Pelc wrote:
> 
>> Sounds like Forth to me. Apart from being a Forth vendor, we eat our
>> own dog food and do all this stuff easily. The commercial Forth
> 
> 
> Forth is actually a lot like dog food - when you first try it, it's 
> horrible and repulsive.

LOL, that's GOLD!  Being one of the fortunate few who was brought up on 
HP calculators, I quite enjoyed a dalliance with Forth in the embedded 
sphere some 20 years ago.  Others though to seems a little backward it.

Cheers,
Alf

larwe wrote:
> On Feb 7, 5:47 am, Alf <alfk...@ieee.removetheobvious.org> wrote:
> 
> 
>>        Years ago, I used QuickBasic to quickly knock up this sort of script,
>>usually 1/2 an hour at most, a nice set of serial and parallel port
> 
> 
> When you are writing non-shippable lab code, your principal constraint
> is ease of use. Therefore your #1 selection criteria should be
> "similarity to stuff you've done before".
> 
> If BASIC is your cup of tea, then perhaps you're best served by using
> VB, though it's not really BASIC of the kind we used to know and love.
> Microsoft makes a free version (Visual Studio Express) available.
> 
> I tend to write this kind of code in C and use either Linux or Cygwin
> depending on what the code actually needs to do. Really, the Windows
> API for serial ports is not unreasonably complicated.
> 
Thanks, Lewin,
	Not much difference as far as I'm concerned, between VB and VC# 
(Express or otherwise).  Still got to cope with that .NET framework and 
find your way through the gazillion functions that it offers.  And its 
horrible serial port handling.
	I, too, have much of this stuff in C (my fave is still BC++ V4.51).
Cheers,
Alf

John Speth wrote:

> I would think the answer would be found not primarily on based on technical 
> merit but rather based on your personal preferences, strengths, and what 
> tools you have within easy reach.  There are so many arguably good ways to 
> go.
> 
You're right, John, and it's not technicl merit I was considering. 
Certainly Quickbasic had very little of that.  It's convenience and 
accessiblity.  My "tools" these days are quite varied from techs through 
embedded assember and C programmers to Windows C++ and C# software 
developers.  I'm looking for one ring to rule them all and in the 
scripting darkness bind them.  If it was just for me, I'd stick with the 
familiar, gcc, C# or even Python.

Cheers,
Alf

In article <fofsbg$i63$00$1@news.t-online.com>,
=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Hans-Bernhard_Br=F6ker?=  <HBBroeker@t-online.de> wrote:
>Alf wrote:
>>     So what scripting tools are you guys using out there?
>
>Unix tools, like the gods intended... ;->  Cygwin works quite well once
>you've wrapped your head around its quirks.
>
>I usually escalate from bash to sed, to awk to perl, as needed.
>
>>     Years ago, I used QuickBasic to quickly knock up this sort of
>> script, usually 1/2 an hour at most, a nice set of serial and parallel
>> port manipulation tools and easy to run little external apps (e.g. a
>> bin2hex utility).  Of course QuickBasic is not compatible with modern
>> Microsoft OS's.
>
>There's VisualBasic and, more importantly, the Windows Scripting Host,
>which runs scripts written in either Basis or JScript.  That's pretty
>much the official solution if you're on MS Windows.

I wonder whether nobody mentions PowerShell, the new Microsoft tool.
The price is right, free as in "free beer" (not freedom.).
It took some inspiration from Python, I guess.
The base idea is to work with typed objects, not strings like
traditional shells. This is nice in itself.

I dumped it after it turned out that

     ls > myfiles.txt

didn't work. ("we do not do file redirection yet").
Also there seems to be no notion of current directory.

I love to hear stories about how it is unusable, but then it
may not.

>


--
-- 
Albert van der Horst, UTRECHT,THE NETHERLANDS
Economic growth -- like all pyramid schemes -- ultimately falters.
albert@spe&ar&c.xs4all.nl &=n http://home.hccnet.nl/a.w.m.van.der.horst

Alf wrote:
>>
> You're right, John, and it's not technicl merit I was considering. 
> Certainly Quickbasic had very little of that.  It's convenience and 
> accessiblity.  My "tools" these days are quite varied from techs through 
> embedded assember and C programmers to Windows C++ and C# software 
> developers.  I'm looking for one ring to rule them all and in the 
> scripting darkness bind them.  If it was just for me, I'd stick with the 
> familiar, gcc, C# or even Python.


Have you ever considered C/C++ interpreter Ch for
scripting?  It is free and runs across platform. You can find the shell 
scripting and C/C++ features in the following link:

   http://www.softintegration.com/docs/ch/shell/
   http://www.softintegration.com/products/chstandard/

The windows serial port I/O is well supported in the Ch.
   http://www.softintegration.com/support/faq/windows.html#serial
   http://www.softintegration.com/products/thirdparty/#robot

of course, Ch is best suitable for embedded scripting:
    http://www.softintegration.com/products/sdk/embedch/
    http://www.softintegration.com/solution/embedded/

Hope it helps.

Alf wrote:
>>
> You're right, John, and it's not technicl merit I was considering. 
> Certainly Quickbasic had very little of that.  It's convenience and 
> accessiblity.  My "tools" these days are quite varied from techs through 
> embedded assember and C programmers to Windows C++ and C# software 
> developers.  I'm looking for one ring to rule them all and in the 
> scripting darkness bind them.  If it was just for me, I'd stick with the 
> familiar, gcc, C# or even Python.


Have you ever considered C/C++ interpreter Ch for
scripting?  It is free and runs across platform. You can find the shell 
scripting and C/C++ features in the following link:

   http://www.softintegration.com/docs/ch/shell/
   http://www.softintegration.com/products/chstandard/

The windows serial port I/O is well supported in the Ch.
   http://www.softintegration.com/support/faq/windows.html#serial
   http://www.softintegration.com/products/thirdparty/#robot

of course, Ch is best suitable for embedded scripting:
    http://www.softintegration.com/products/sdk/embedch/
    http://www.softintegration.com/solution/embedded/

Hope it helps.