Hi.

As far as i can remember, Rob said something about a serial line protocol being developed, that would allow (multiple?) extensions to be on the serial port. However, I was unable to find any details on this yet. What´s the status of this development?
Also, I gathered a few ideas from various posts on this BBS, that also handled the serial port and its protocol. While thinking about my baby (nav´em, see the navigation project thread), I realized that we might have a huge need for a serial bus protocol that allows multiple extensions on the serial port, like a GPS and an external control stick. so here is what I think might help.

1. each extension has to have a serial inside (empeg side) and a serial outside (open side) port, both driven at a given speed (I would prefer 115200bps, but I know this is difficult to do)


2. A packet on the serial port has the following format:
   <recipient ID><sender ID><length><data/command>


3. If an incoming packet (either on the inside or the outside port) is not addressed to the given extension, it is simply forwarded to the other port (from inside to outside and vice versa)

The sender/recipient ID would have to be predefined (I´m willing to maintain a central list for this). However, I can think of extensions to be attached in multiple instances, like a temperature sensor (one for inside temp., one for outside temp.), so we would have to develop a way to detect such situations and change the ID on the fly. Any ideas on this?


cu,
sven