15 Mar
2005
15 Mar
'05
4:38 p.m.
Randy McLaughlin wrote:
From: "Vintage Computer Festival" <vcf at
siconic.com>
Sent: Tuesday, March 15, 2005 9:13 AM
I have 2 PCs and 4 Macs without serial ports.
Doc
On Tue, 15 Mar 2005, Dwight K. Elvey wrote:
I keep forgetting, what is the most recommended way to hook up a dial up
modem to Linux ;-)
I have never seen a modern PC without a serial port but if USB is
absolutely required there are USB to serial adapters. I tend to agree with you. We should be thinking
this way.
Still, I believe that development work should be done in
an environment that is handy and convenient. The USB is
just a machine interconnect. One just has to keep in mind
what the final product will be like. In other words, don't
lock the design into one specific format.
The only issue I have with USB is that it requires drivers
for each machine it is connected to. These have to be
specific to the USB device we use to interface with.
RS-232 is generic enough that we could run things from
text files using simple terminal modes on almost any machine.
I dispute Barry's assertion that serial is going away. Perhaps in
consumer products it will be supplanted by USB. But in development
products and applications, and low level controller and embedded system
devices, it'll be around for quite a while yet.
I'd argue that the serial port is the most under-rated device is
computing. It is the most widely deployed communcations protocol and
allows computers 1 month old to connect and transfer data to computers
that are over 30 years old.
As for Dwight's main argument that the interface is not the main focus, I
agree.
--
Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer
Festival
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