There is one catch with most of the driver's that you are talking about,
they all require you to be logged in as an administrator, which is realy
what I call an adhack approach to a driver.  I have looked at the drivers
offerred for free and they just don't appeal to me do to above mentioned
things.

I will send you an example later this evening on how to use DeviceIoControl
to read the signals from the LPT PORT.

Regards,

James


-----Original Message-----
From: pic microcontroller discussion list
[mailto:PICLIST@MITVMA.MIT.EDU]On Behalf Of Ruben Jvnsson
Sent: Thursday, September 19, 2002 4:46 AM
To: PICLIST@MITVMA.MIT.EDU
Subject: Re: [EE]: Printer port control software


If you go for the driver approach (which are available
for free, you don't have to write any) you get 12
outputs (D0-D7, strobe, autofdxt, init and slctin) and
5 inputs (ack, busy, pe, slct and error) without any
special hardware or jumpers attached to the lpt.

With CreateFile()/WriteFile() I have been told
(haven't tried it) that by only tying busy and pe to
ground and slct to +5V through autofdxt, you get 8
outputs (D0-D7). This will leave 2 inputs (ack and
error) - which may be fine for a lot of things. So -
how do I use DeviceIOControl() to read these? Any
example source?

Ruben

> All windows 32bit versions are easy to write to the printer port.  It
> can be done with two API calls.  One to open a handle to the device:
> CreateFile(..) and the other to Write your data out to the port.
> WriteFile(...).  This does 100% work under windows 95/98/me and
> Windows NT3.51/4.0/2000 and XP. No problems.  The only criteria for it
> to work is that your device attached properly utilize the nStrobe,nAck
> and nBusy signals according to Compatibility mode.
>
> I have sever devices which I have made and wrote nice windows programs
> for them without having to write a special VXD or device driver.
>
> It is realy simple.  Problem is people think it is hard or are not
> versted enough with Windows HAL (Hardward abstraction layer) to take
> advantage.  You can even read the signals from the port using
> DeviceIOControl(...) API function even in NT/2000/XP.
>
> Again you don't have to have any special things for this other than
> your hardware follow the compatibility handshake.
>
> Regards,
>
> James
>
>
==============================
Ruben Jvnsson
AB Liros Elektronik
Box 9124, 200 39 Malmv, Sweden
TEL INT +46 40142078
FAX INT +46 40947388
ruben@pp.sbbs.se
==============================

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