This is a SimpleMotion V2 library, which is an API to control motor controller from any programmable platform, such as PC (Linux, Win, Mac), Rasperry Pi, MCU or PLC system.
For main documentation, see: http://granitedevices.com/wiki/SimpleMotion_V2
There are files that are needed for basic SimpleMotion usage, and files that are optional and needed only for certain features. Following may be useful info when porting library to different platforms (such as embedded MCU) to avoid unnecessary work on some files.
Following files are the core library. These must be included in the compiled projects to achieve a working solution.
- simplemotion.c/.h
- sm485.h
- sm_consts.c
- simplemotion_defs.h
- simplemotion_private.h
- busdevice.c/.h
Following files are not required in the core library, however you might need them depending on your application.
- bufferedmotion.c/.h - Library used for buffered motion stream applications
- devicedeployment.c/.h - Library used for installing firmware and loading settings into target devices. Can be used to configure devices automatically in-system.
- files in drivers/ folder - These are platofrm & hardware specific SM bus interface device drivers
Following files need modification if ported to another platform where SimpleMotion communication interface device driver does not yet exist
- If porting to a non-PC system, make sure that ENABLE_BUILT_IN_DRIVERS is not defined at compilation time (see qmake .pri file for clues) and use smOpenBusWithCallbacks instead of smOpenBus
- Write custom communication interface device driver and use smOpenBusWithCallbacks to open bus with custom driver callbacks
- See existing drivers for example
- Only four simple functions are needed to write custom port driver: open port, close port, write port and read port
To include SM library in Qt project, simply place the library files under project folder and add the following line in your .pro file:
include(SimpleMotionV2/SimpleMotionV2.pri)
It is possible to compile shared and dynamic libraries (i.e. .dll or .a file) from the SM library source package. One of the easiest ways of compiling library is to use Qt Creator, where a ready-to-compile project file is provided. Just open SimpleMotionV2lib.pro in Qt Creator and compile it with the compiler of your choice. The resulting library files may be used in other applications.
Alternatively create a new library project in your favorite programming tool and compile the provided source codes into a libraray. You might need to study workings of the .pri file to succeed.
Windows users notice that a .dll library compiled with MinGW might not be compatible with MSVC. So if you're developing with MSVC, it's best to complile the dll using MSVC compiler. Qt Creator allows using Visual Studio's MSVC as compiler when configured properly.
Most of programming languages have wrapper solutions that can call C functions. To get started, search some examples from the Internet for your programmign language.
If you write a wrapper library or any form of working demo application to your non-C programming language, feel free to contribute it to us and get credited!
If you wish to link library statically in other programming environments, i.e. in Visual Studio, it might be easiest to grap the sources and add them into the project so that they will be compiled along your project. This way library will be included in your application and it does not depend on external shared or dynamic libraries.
LabView allows including .dll file in the project and calling the C functions. To do that, first compile a .dll file as instructed in "Creating shared / dynamic library" section above.
SimpleMotion library has been written to compile and run also on microcontrollers. On peripheral side it requires basically just USART and RS485 driver that can produce at least the default 468 000 BPS baud rate with less than 5% error.
In practive one just has to write a custom USART/RS485 driver in SM library to get going. It's beneficial to use DMA with USART to avoid missing bytes.
To get started, see existing serial port drivers unders drivers/serial subfolder and add your own. After that, one can use smBDOpenWithCallbacks or modify busdevice.c to support the new driver.
For practical usage examples, refer to https://github.com/GraniteDevices/SimpleMotionV2Examples
There are multiple branches in this repository. Summary:
- master: Latest stable version. The goal here is to keep API stable and backwards compatible with earlier master versions. Master branch will be updated occasionally by merge commit from develop.
- develop: Latest development version, may contain unfinished features & changing API. Be warned that your application using under development features might break.
- feature/nnn: Under development features that eventually shall be merged to develop.
Usually it's safest to use master version. If latest additions are necessary, then use develop.