Flowcode Support Board

If your network devices have an open TCP port, such as a web server, then you could simply try a connect and see if it successful or fails

Hi Leigh,
I will see if I can give that a try, other than that I am going to give it up as a losing battle.
I did find a few schoolboy errors but still no good, here is the latest file if anyone has any ideas. Regards,
Bob

Hi Bob

Unless you are keen to get into the linux, issuing a Ping isn't looking likely on the RPI.

However I think I may have a cheap solution for you to consider.

ESP8266's are very cheap, even from amazon

https://www.amazon.co.uk/DollaTek-ESP82 ... C94&sr=8-7

If you incorporate one of these, somewhere in your system, even creating a PIC or such like just to test / report, and communicate with it by issuing AT-Commands over a UART, then it looks like you can very easily issue a Ping


That's taken from the AT Command Set manual. I've no access to hardware just now so can't actually test this, but I have used AT commands to control the ESP8266 many times with good results.

Regards

Hi,
Thanks for the idea, I have decided to order a W5500 module as that with the FC example and documentation seems to do everything I need. It seems the most logical route seeing how I failed so miserably trying to get it to work on a Pi.

Regards,
Bob

Hi,
I have purchased a W5500 module, not the one used in the Flowcode document but it is 3.3v compatible. I have Used the original ARP code and added the Raspberry Pi and swapped all the LCD code for the HDMI output.
The idea is the W5500 does the work and the Ethernet port on the Pi is just for programming. Unfortunately so far the computer says No, the issue is that it appears to hang at the Open socket command.
I would like to be able to test the W5500 to make sure that is actually working, I found this post
viewtopic.php?p=15184&hilit=W5500#p15184
In the first post the poster says he tested his module with Putty, I have a FTDI C232HM cable which is USB to SPI so I was wondering if I could use this.
Does anyone know if this is what could work and what I need to send from Putty to test the device.

Failing that I am trying to dig out a Arduino but as the UNO is 5v I am going to need to get level shifters so I do not trash the module.

Regards,
Bob

Hi Bob

Two resistors can do uni-directional level shifting. 1K2 and a 2K2 should do the trick. Amazon and other cheap sites will sell bi-directional shifters for around £5 for a handful (or thereabouts). I got some where each of the modules had four individual level shifters on board.

Your cable sounds like it would work. I don't know what commands FC sends to the W5500, but you would use PuTTY (or similar) to send / receive those. Whatever your chart has in (for example) a transaction (component macro) or send byte etc you would instead issue via PuTTY.

Regards

Hi Bob,
The first thing to check in your Flowcode project is that the W5500:Initialise is successful.
This does a check of the SPI write and read, and returns 1 for success, 0 for failure.

Hi,
Thanks for the suggestion, in the example it does not check and just moves to the next step so I will put a return value in to make sure that stage has worked (or not).

Regards,
Bob

Hi Bob

A logic analyser really comes into it's own in cases like this. Even really cheap ones from amazon etc work well.

You can get an 8-ch analyser for about £10 that plugs into your PC and free software allows you to check SPI/I2C/UART etc signals. You can see what is being sent and received in real time (well until you run out of storage <s>)

Connect Gnd/MISO/MOSI to your board with jumpers and off you go.

Regards