Use of serial port in Visual Basic .NET

[IanHale]

Is there any way of simply using the COM port from Visual Basic? All the
solutions I've found seem to require the use of Visual Studio whereas I only
have the the 'basic' version. I'm not after anything too complicated as all I
want to do is read a serial stream of data.

Thanks in advance

[Cor Ligthert]

IanHale,

You can use it, just look in the newsgroups on Dick Grier

http://groups-beta.google.com/groups...=Search+Groups

I hope this helps

Cor

[IanHale]

Thanks Cor

Sorry if I'm being a bit slow - but the search turned up many entries - none
of which seemed to answer simple question - do you know of any simple guide
on getting going. I even tried looking up Dick's book on Amazon - but they
claim a 6-8 week delivery (if at all!)

"Cor Ligthert" wrote:

IanHale,

You can use it, just look in the newsgroups on Dick Grier

http://groups-beta.google.com/groups...=Search+Groups

I hope this helps

Cor

[Stelrad Doulton]

p/invoke the win32 CreateFile, WriteFile, ReadFile, CloseHandle from
coredll.dll (see below). Call CreateFile with "COM1:" for eample and hey
presto you have an IntPtr to an open com port. From there use this handle
with the other stuff.

You might wanna create a class to wrap all this stuff to make it more OO and
to implement IDisposable on it.

[DllImport("core dll.dll")]

private static extern bool CloseHandle(Int Ptr hObject);

[DllImport("core dll.dll")]

private static extern bool WriteFile(IntPt r hFile, byte[] lpBuffer, Int32
nNumberOfBytesT oWrite, ref Int32 lpNumberOfBytes Written, IntPtr
lpOverlapped);

[DllImport("core dll.dll")]

private static extern bool ReadFile(IntPtr hFile, byte[] lpBuffer, Int32
nNumberOfBytesT oRead, ref Int32 lpNumberOfBytes Read, IntPtr lpOverlapped);
[DllImport("core dll.dll")]

private static extern IntPtr CreateFile( string lpFileName,

UInt32 dwDesiredAccess ,

UInt32 dwShareMode,

IntPtr lpSecurityAttri butes,

UInt32 dwCreationDispo sition,

UInt32 dwFlagsAndAttri butes,

IntPtr hTemplateFile);
"IanHale" <Ia*****@discus sions.microsoft .com> wrote in message
news:89******** *************** ***********@mic rosoft.com...

Thanks Cor

Sorry if I'm being a bit slow - but the search turned up many entries -
none
of which seemed to answer simple question - do you know of any simple
guide
on getting going. I even tried looking up Dick's book on Amazon - but they
claim a 6-8 week delivery (if at all!)

"Cor Ligthert" wrote:

IanHale,

You can use it, just look in the newsgroups on Dick Grier

http://groups-beta.google.com/groups...=Search+Groups

I hope this helps

Cor

[Stelrad Doulton]

don't know the syntax for pinvoking in VB

"Stelrad Doulton" <___@____.com > wrote in message
news:%2******** ********@TK2MSF TNGP10.phx.gbl. ..

p/invoke the win32 CreateFile, WriteFile, ReadFile, CloseHandle from
coredll.dll (see below). Call CreateFile with "COM1:" for eample and hey
presto you have an IntPtr to an open com port. From there use this handle
with the other stuff.

You might wanna create a class to wrap all this stuff to make it more OO
and to implement IDisposable on it.

[DllImport("core dll.dll")]

private static extern bool CloseHandle(Int Ptr hObject);

[DllImport("core dll.dll")]

private static extern bool WriteFile(IntPt r hFile, byte[] lpBuffer, Int32
nNumberOfBytesT oWrite, ref Int32 lpNumberOfBytes Written, IntPtr
lpOverlapped);

[DllImport("core dll.dll")]

private static extern bool ReadFile(IntPtr hFile, byte[] lpBuffer, Int32
nNumberOfBytesT oRead, ref Int32 lpNumberOfBytes Read, IntPtr lpOverlapped);
[DllImport("core dll.dll")]

private static extern IntPtr CreateFile( string lpFileName,

UInt32 dwDesiredAccess ,

UInt32 dwShareMode,

IntPtr lpSecurityAttri butes,

UInt32 dwCreationDispo sition,

UInt32 dwFlagsAndAttri butes,

IntPtr hTemplateFile);
"IanHale" <Ia*****@discus sions.microsoft .com> wrote in message
news:89******** *************** ***********@mic rosoft.com...

Thanks Cor

Sorry if I'm being a bit slow - but the search turned up many entries -
none
of which seemed to answer simple question - do you know of any simple
guide
on getting going. I even tried looking up Dick's book on Amazon - but
they
claim a 6-8 week delivery (if at all!)

"Cor Ligthert" wrote:

IanHale,

You can use it, just look in the newsgroups on Dick Grier

http://groups-beta.google.com/groups...=Search+Groups

I hope this helps

Cor

[Cor Ligthert]

Ian,

The most unliked part of computing for me, however this should do it for
you.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/msdnmag/is...netserialcomm/

I hope this helps,

Cor

[IanHale]

Thanks Cor - I'll give it a go. The words 'where angels fear to tread....'
spring to mind!

"Cor Ligthert" wrote:

Ian,

The most unliked part of computing for me, however this should do it for
you.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/msdnmag/is...netserialcomm/

I hope this helps,

Cor