Comms Status  -  serial port status monitor

by Lee Calcraft

Double-clicking on the CommStat icon in a directory viewer,
or clicking on it in the Menu system will install its icon
on the icon bar. Clicking on the icon bar icon opens a
single window giving a status report on the settings and
activity of the serial port. The program automatically
checks all data twice a second, and if there are any
changes, it updates the relevant part of the display.
Checking is stopped when the display window is closed.

CommStat will prove to be very useful if you are having
trouble with a comms package, of if you just want to check
the way your machine is set up, or if you wish to monitor
any comms activity - from printing via the serial port to
comms via modem or Pocket book connectivity using the
A-Link.

The display is split into three main areas. The five values
in the top left-hand segment are pretty self-explanatory,
giving the main settings of the serial port.

Beneath these are readouts from the two serial buffers. The
top one gives the number of unprocessed bytes waiting in the
serial input buffer. If this stays at a fixed value higher
than zero then your comms software is not processing the
incoming data. The second value is the space remaining in
the output buffer. By default on RISC OS 3 this is 191 when
there is no activity. But if you are running Hearsay, for
example, this will jump to 16383 because Hearsay adds a 16K
serial buffer.

The information in the top right-hand area is split into two
sections. The status bits at the bottom give a full readout
of the 16 status bits which carry comms information on RISC
OS 3 (in response to OS_SerialOp 0). For example, bit zero
(at the far right of the 0-7 display) indicates whether
XON/XOFF protocol is in use. For full details of the 16
bits, see the RISC OS 3 PRM page 2-462.

Four of these bits have been given an individual icon in the
top right-hand area of the display: Ring, DCD, DSR and CTS.
When your modem goes on line, the Ring line goes high, and
you will see this reflected in the Ring icon in the display.
If you are using a PC rather than an Archimedes comms lead
with your modem, then DCD rather than Ring will go high when
you are on line. The DSR and CTS displays give the state of
these important lines.



Text and Software  Lee Calcraft 1994
