[dorkbotpdx-blabber] another chip-level question ...

[Brian Richardson]

I haven't had to do this yet.  But it seems like you could wire the uart on
the avr to all of the devices and put some switches between the uart and
each device.  Then you'd basically open the uart/interact with the
chip/close uart and move on to the next chip.  You might run out of pins
trying to do this, so that might involve some shift registers and swearing.
;)

Monitoring the serial port on the computer could be annoying, you might have
to write something that would continously try to open the serial port and
read all data.  But that'd be easy to rig together in Python or some other
script language.

Usual cavaet of "I've never done that" but it seems like it'd work.. heh

On Thu, May 14, 2009 at 3:54 PM, Mykle Hansen <mykle at mykle.com> wrote:

> hi again,
>
> for this new speedvest+plus+weirdness design i'm making, i
> plan to have an arduino talking to several different chips.
> my arduino only has one UART, and i have two devices that
> want to talk to it -- one supertex chip that wants to read
> out a bit pattern, and one GPS unit that wants to write
> various location data at 4800 baud.  also, i would love to
> be able to maintain a serial connection to the computer
> for debug output while i develop this thing.
>
> so i'm asking: what do you do when you want your arduino
> to have more serial ports?  is there a strategy for sharing
> one UART between many devices?  is there a sub-chip that
> can MUX several serial conversations into one?  is there
> a way to repurpose the SPI or TW units in the ATmega168
> into standard serial ports?   what would dorkbot do?
>
> my fallback is to use bit-bashing to send the output,
> use the UART for the input, and reduce the debugging
> to a vocabulary of "the green LED means it's working."
>
> thanks for your help.  i promise that if i get anything
> blinking before i leave town for the Faire, i will bring
> it to the meeting or send a picture.
>
> -mykle-
> ---
> HELP!  A Bear is Eating Me!
> http://helpabeariseatingme.com
>
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