Anyone using a Terminal Server in-car?

I did a bit of searching and reading on the web and found several terminal servers that sound nice (BlackBox, Moxa, Digi, etc). The simplest type for easy integration are the ones that map their serial ports to device files on the unix machine over the ethernet. All of the models that I saw that supported doing this listed the versions of unix they worked with. Some mentioned Linux, but only x86 based. I'm guessing this means you don't get their source code so you can't port it to the empeg.

Does anyone know of a termserv that can be used this way with the empeg? It would be a great way of connecting several serial devices (Stalk, OBDII, GPS, etc) all at the same time.

I have a Comtol Rocketport 8Si. Works great so far and has Linux support (can actually share its 8 ports b/w Win and linux machines). I got mine (new) on eBay, and I see there are more up for sale - try here.

(edit: I'm not using mine in-car. It is a bit big. FWIW, they also make a 4-port model that might be smaller. Another company I have liked is lantronix; they have a 4-port MSS-4 that is popular enough that you might find one on eBay sometime. Linux drivers? Come to think of it, not sure why you'd need them to make this work...)

Without drivers on the unix system, how do you get data from a /dev/tty file to make it across the network to the terminal server?

The data sheet for the one you mention does say "...Linux TTY ports..." but they don't say if you get the source or a binary that only runs on x86 Linux.

Without drivers on the unix system, how do you get data from a /dev/tty file to make it across the network to the terminal server?

(I forgot to state my assumption that you'd connect the Empeg to whatever terminal servcer you'd use via the Empeg's ethernet....)
Well, some of these folks (and cyclades is another fairly popular one I meant to mention) provide drivers that provide direct port redirection (of COMs/TTYs) that can simplify things (if teh drivers aren't buggy!). However, I believe that you can access serial on most of these term servers using sockets as well. There may be some limitations that are worth researching, but most of them will allow socket-based telnet, dial-up, etc. without host drivers and can be configured (I think!) to connect to whatever DTE you are thinking to install in the car

Anybody else?

Well, some of these folks (and cyclades is another fairly popular one I meant to mention) provide drivers that provide direct port redirection (of COMs/TTYs) that can simplify things (if teh drivers aren't buggy!).

That was my original question... Do any of them offer source code so that you can compile the drivers for the empeg? None of the ones that I found give you source.

I was hoping to avoid having to do custom programming to interface with one. Since there's no standardized way that they use (each vendor does theirs differently), you'd either have to reverse engineer their protocol or write a hacked telnet client. Either way, it's not a drop-in solution.

Hi.

The comport (?) driver that was mentioned earlier seems to be available in source. It includes a .bin file though, which may or may not be used for the serial hub itself.

cu,
sven