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NOUVEAU PROGRAMMING WITH ISA AND PCMCIA CARDS

A new way of programming ISA and PCMCIA cards on USBISA and USBPCMCIA family products using ArsCmd utility

1. Introduction

This article describes the new way of programming of ISA and PCMCIA cards, which are mounted on our USBISA family of products, or USBPCMCIA product.

We have number of customers who have ISA and/or PCMCIA cards which as a hardware range from relatively simple, to very complex, and in the same time have relatively simple way of initializing these cards - to let them start working.

There are 2 existing ways to deal with an ISA or PCMCIA cards mounted on USBISA family or USBPCMCIA:

To use our Universal Software Layer - with the existing binaries of the ISA or PCMCIA card software

To use our SDKBUS kit - to convert the source of the software

The first of the above ways has limitations and covers specific cases. In addition the existing ISA / PCMCIA binaries are fixed and cannot be easily modified.

The second way require good programming skills and familiarity with particular compilers or development environment.

We have recognized the need of providing a new way of programming which will be useful for all of our users. We have implemented additional functionality in our ArsCmd.exe utility to allow simple and easy ways of programming of ISA and PCMCIA cards.

2. How do I program with ArsCmd utility?

2.1. Commands

The programming is done by using of the standard set of commands to access the memory and i/o space of an ISA and PCMCIA card and the new commands for control of the commands execution.

There are several new commands included in ArsCmd.exe -

Onins - turns on and starts inserting the all the following commands in a commands buffer

Save - saves the commands buffer in a text file

Read - reads a commands sequence text file and loads it in the commands buffer

Run - executes all of the commands in the buffer

Trace - executes the commands one by one line by line advancing by a key hit

To get familiar with the programming - please use one ISA or PCMCIA card mounted on USBISA or USBPCMCIA and run ArsCmd.exe utility. Select a driver - either (1) as the first or only one or any other available number - it there are multiple USBISA / USBPCMCIA cards connected.

2.2. Recording and saving commands sequence

One simple commands sequence to record and save commands is -

Onins - to start recording commands in the buffer

Selectdrv 1 (or 2,3…) - to explicitly show what device the following commands are for

Outb 111 22 (any combination of commands) - put commands in the buffer

Save tst1.txt - save the commands in a text file

The resulting text file shows the sequence of commands saved. It may be edited and modified by any text editor - including NotePad, Write and WordPad.

Once you get familiar with the syntax of the commands used you do not need to go through recording of commands and can create directly the commands sequence text file.

2.3. Executing commands sequence inside ArsCmd

The way to execute commands when ArsCmd is started and there are previously recorded commands is -

Run - runs all the commands

Or trace - runs commands one at a time If there are no previously recorded commands you can do -

Read tst1.txt - reads commands sequence text file

Run - runs all the commands

Or trace - runs commands one at a time

2.4. Executing commands sequence outside ArsCmd

There is a way of executing commands from a command line -

C:\Program Files\ARS Technologies\ARSTech Utilities\ArsCmd txt1.txt

The ArsCmd utility starts reads the txt1.txt file and loads the commands in the buffer, runs all commands and exits.

2.5. Recoding and using execution results

There is a way of recording the results of the execution in a text file -

C:\Program Files\ARS Technologies\ARSTech Utilities\ArsCmd txt1.txt > run1.txt

Instead of going on screen the results are saved in a text file - run1.txt. This file maybe later analyzed and used by any other program.

2.6. Specifics

The way described above applies to non Plug and Play ISA card mounted on USBISA type cards.

Plug and Play ISA cards mounted on USBISA family of cards, or a PCMCIA card mounted on a USBPCMCIA need to be configured in the proper way - to have a particular i/o or memory address assigned to them.

ARS Technologies enumerator - ArsEnum2 utility can be used for configuring of ISA Plug and Play cards and PCMCIA cards. For the particular way of configuring please refer to the our User’s Guide.

3. Examples

3.1. An example of ISA i/o card on USBISA

In our SDKBUS we have number of working examples of reading/writing of sector/s from a hard disk using a standard ISA input/output card - with a floppy and IDE controllers and 2 serial and a parallel ports.

To run the example, please use one ISA input/output card, mounted on an USBISA type card - USBISA, USBISA-ra, USBISA-sl, USBISA-x3 or USBISA-x5 card. You will need to connect an IDE cable to a hard disk, make sure that the hard disk jumper is selected as master/single, connect an USB cable to the host and to USBISA and power on the hard disk.

Start ArsCmd, select the first driver and type the following commands -

selectdrv 1

onins

outb 1f2 1

outb 1f3 1

outb 1f4 0

outb 1f5 0

outb 1f6 a0

outb 1f7 20

inb 1f7

infifow 1f0 100

save tst1.txt The above sequence reads one sector, the first one (normally the partition table), of the hard disk.

To execute the sequence, do from command line - C:> ArsCmd tst1.txt

3.2. An example of PCMCIA + CF card on USBPCMCIA

In our SDKBUS we have one example of reading/writing of sector/s from a Compact Flash (CF) card mounted on a PCMCIA to CF adapter.

To run the example, please use one CF card + PCMCIA to CF adapter, mounted on an USBPCMCIA card. You will need to configure the CF card, using the ArsEnum2 utility to a particular I/O address - for ex. 170.

Start ArsCmd, select the first driver and type the following commands -

selectdrv 1

onins

outb 172 1

outb 173 1

outb 174 0

outb 175 0

outb 176 a0

outb 177 20

inb 177

infifow 170 100

save tst2.txt The above sequence reads one sector, the first one (normally the partition table), of the CF card.

To execute the sequence, do from command line - C:> ArsCmd tst2.txt

4. Conclusion

The described way of programming is simple, straightforward and easy. We appreciate the feedback from our customers and may add more functionality to the ArsCmd utility.