serial port comunication

Question

1. How do you access the serial port on a c# project, using windows forms? 2. How do you do access the serial port on an asp.net project? The port is on the client side, not the server. Does it has to be done with activex, if so, how? Thanx, Pedro

spgilmore · Answer

1) To use serial ports on the server side or in a standalone app you don't have to use ActiveX. Here's a link to show you how to do it in C# using plain Win32 API function wrappers. http://www.codeproject.com/dotnet/DotNetComPorts.asp Here is a library that Microsoft provides doing things in almost the same way using P/Invoke. http://msdn.microsoft.com/msdnmag/issues/02/10/NETSerialComm/default.aspx 2) Use the best tool for the job. If you're trying to do work on the client side use client-side tools. This means ActiveX client-side scripting (javascript if it can be done) or Java applets. Any one will do but frankly I'd write a Java applet. ActiveX isn't available on all platforms and even ActiveX doesn't make accessing serial ports look very easy. If you're going to use ActiveX you may want to build your own ActiveX control. This is easy enough using Visual C++ which you probably already have.

Bill Farley · Answer

Keep in mind that the mscomm ocx is not a part of the .NET framework so including it in a non VC6/VB6 application may run afoul of a license agreement Bill F

kovan · Answer

ok i lied here is a link http://www.vbdotnetheaven.com/Code/Jun2003/2067.asp its vb.net but am sure you can easily convert it ot c#

kovan · Answer

use 1. mscomm32.ocx 2. yes you need to use activex how? you can use c++ or you can use vb6 (i havent seen this done in .NET yet so i couldnt give you a proper .NET answer)