Linux versions of hyperterminal or similar

[ianw1974]

Having a problem at the minute. I've been trying to find a way to get my USB --> Serial cable working. The kernel module is loaded already, so this is working perfectly fine.

 

It's a Prolific PL2303 USB to Serial Bridge, effectively meaning my laptop without a hard com1 can use this cable. As I've said, the module (pl2303) loads perfectly well.

 

Now, the problem I've got is one of two things. First, I need to find out which com port or /dev/ttys device has been assigned for it (ttys0, ttys1, etc).

 

Secondly, I'm trying to find out what app I can use that's similar to hyperterminal in Windows. I've already installed minicom to use from the command line, but unfortunately, can't use it because of my first problem as well.

 

If anyone has any ideas for apps, as well as how I can find out what com port/ttys device has been assigned, that would be great.

 

[neddie]

I used minicom to talk to my GPS over the serial port - worked quite well. I just experimented with ttyS0, ttyS1 etc until I got a response :)

[ianw1974]

I tried that also, first I started with:

 

minicom -s

 

to set the config, and I went through ttys0 up to ttys9 without being able to get the modem to show online at the bottom. I tried pressing enter at the time, because I was connected to a switch via the serial port, and this should have given me a response, but unfortunately it didn't.

 

Minicom was defaulted to ttys1 when I started with it, but unsure as to why I can't get any further with trying to find out what port is selected for this specific device.

 

Dunno how to debug to find it out.

[Steve Scrimpshire]

What I would do is not load the driver at boot, but after booting, open a terminal, su to root and run

 

tail -v -f /var/log/messages

 

Then plug the cable in, modprobe the driver and see if it says something like:

"Created new serial device /dev/ttyS0"

(my serial modem when I had it was named that....note the capital S)

[ianw1974]

Steve,

 

Nice one, that may have helped me figure out where I was going wrong. I've not connected it today, but checked the log file for tty stuff. So:

 

[root@europa ian]# cat /var/log/messages | grep tty
Aug  4 15:23:20 europa  -- ian[3665]: LOGIN ON tty1 BY ian
Aug  4 15:35:39 europa  -- ian[16872]: LOGIN ON tty1 BY ian
Aug 11 16:08:19 europa su(pam_unix)[19184]: authentication failure; logname= uid=500 euid=0 tty= ruser=ian rhost=  user=root
Aug 17 10:12:04 europa kernel: usb 1-1: PL-2303 converter now attached to ttyUSB0
Aug 17 10:12:26 europa  -- root[3716]: ROOT LOGIN ON tty1
Aug 17 10:22:03 europa kernel: usb 1-1: PL-2303 converter now attached to ttyUSB0
Aug 17 10:22:24 europa  -- ian[3719]: LOGIN ON tty1 BY ian
Aug 17 10:47:15 europa kernel: usb 1-1: PL-2303 converter now attached to ttyUSB0
Aug 17 10:52:29 europa rpmdrake[3976]: Extracting header of perl-IO-Stty-02-7mdk.noarch from /var/lib/urpmi/hdlist.main.cz
Aug 17 11:00:07 europa rpmdrake[4523]: Extracting header of mgetty-1.1.30-8mdk.i586 from /var/lib/urpmi/hdlist.main.cz
Aug 17 11:00:17 europa rpmdrake[4523]: Extracting header of mgetty-sendfax-1.1.30-8mdk.i586 from /var/lib/urpmi/hdlist.main.cz

 

as you can see, it was picking up on ttyUSB0, which is why I had no joy getting it to work yesterday.

 

I'll have to try this again later, and see if minicom will do the trick for me now that it will be pointing to the correct device instead of ttyS devices and failing.

 

Any ideas for GUI based hyperterminal equivalents to save using minicom?

[scoonma]

Hi Ian,

 

you wrote:

 

Any ideas for GUI based hyperterminal equivalents to save using minicom?

 

I found CuteCom, which is quite up to date:

 

http://cutecom.sourceforge.net/

 

Maybe later you find this handy (serial/net proxy):

 

http://sourceforge.net/projects/ser2net

 

 

Have fun,

 

scoonma