Many, many years ago I learned basic programming using BASIC (the version that came with PC DOS 5, I think). I even wrote the odd game, but it was all pretty awful. A few years later I learned Turbo Pascal, which was a fantastic experience compared to Basic. It felt all sciency and grown up, and it was my first experience with a real IDE. I even ended up buying a TP book, and became somewhat proficient. This must've been when I was around 18-19.I then stopped programming completely.
At around 30 years of age I decided it was time to get serious about programming again -- I was doing mass spectrometry and needed a simple program that could generate a series of solutions to the identity of a mass/charge ratio given a range of elements. I probably had a quick look at C and C++, but ended up getting a Python book and have been happy Python programmer ever since.
The problem is that I've never been a /good/ python programmer -- and in all these years I've never fully understood the use for (or, in all fairness, use OF) OOP. And at the moment it seems to be holding me back -- all the examples that I find of the use the threading module as well as writing GUIs (using e.g. wxPython) involve using classes. And I just don't understand them well enough to sort out what I need done.
Anyway, long story short: I've written a basic program for communicating with a Metrohm Titrino 736 GP via RS 232. It's found here: https://sourceforge.net/projects/pytitrino/
Currently:
* the code is a mess (see above)
* it works fine for doing monotonic and dynamic end point titrations (MET and DET)
* it saves data to a file, but does so silently (i.e. when you run you won't get any feedback that things are working properly...)
* it uses the thread (not threading) module
* I've managed to pass parameters back and forth between the thread and the main loop using Queue
There are probably much better solutions. One day I hope to be able to stick a GUI on top of it, but the more I look at it I get the impression that one writes the GUI first, then the engine...not that I'd know.
Anyway. That's what I've been up to. Anyone with a bit of programming experience, whom is in possession of an old-school Titrino (i.e. using RS 232) and wants to save $1.5k in software licenses may be interested in taking the sources and turning them into something useful.
Lindqvist - a blog about Linux and Science. Mostly.
This information is highly valuable for me. Can you help me with a little bit more? Which type of cable you are using? what about the driver? At the moment I am having problems with the connection between the pc and the titrino. I am a newby but I beleive that with your help I will succed. Please help me!!
ReplyDeleteNo specific driver, since this is on linux -- things 'just work'. I use a USB -> serial (DE-9) cable.
DeleteIf you're on windows or mac you probably have to install whatever driver came with your cable if you're using USB -> serial. No idea what you need if you're using a proper serial card.
Use a sniffer to look at the communication to see what's going on -- if you're on windows: http://www.serialmon.com/
On linux, I used the script here to test different settings and troubleshoot: http://www.varesano.net/blog/fabio/serial%20rs232%20connections%20python