ITUB20154055A1 - METHOD OF SENDING CONTROL COMMANDS BETWEEN A COMPUTER AND A PERIPHERAL DEVICE AND ASSOCIATED DEVICE. - Google Patents

Description

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“METHOD OF SENDING CONTROL COMMANDS BETWEEN A COMPUTER

AND AN ASSOCIATED PERIPHERAL AND PERIPHERAL "

Field of the invention

The present invention relates to the field of computer programs and in detail relates to a method of sending control commands between a computer and a peripheral.

The present invention also relates to a peripheral device managed through the said method of sending commands.

Technique Note

It is known that a computer and peripherals require an exchange of commands and data to be transferred, typically from the former to the latter, to allow performing the functions that the peripheral is appointed to perform.

The method of data exchange and commands described in the patent RM2013A000728 provides for the execution of commands and data exchange only in immediate mode: the activities are carried out as soon as the connected device (computer or peripheral) that must perform them is free.

Furthermore, the original method described in the patent RM2013A000728 provides for the possibility of queuing the data to be transferred, but does not provide the same possibility for the commands: while the data is accumulated and transferred according to the reception capacity of the recipient device, for the commands there is the possibility of having only one "pending".

In the astronomical field, both amateur and professional, computer-controlled motorized telescopes have long existed. The purpose of the engines is

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that of automatically moving the telescope when you want to point steadily towards a celestial object, in order to compensate for the continuous misalignment caused by the Earth's rotation.

Another purpose of the motorization of telescopes is to allow automatic pointing on a desired celestial object, by means of commands given by a computer program that contains a database of stellar objects and calculates the right ascension and declination of the object.

The motorized telescopes are connected to the computer, according to the model, by means of different types of physical connection, for example: serial interface (RS232), USB interface, Parallel interface. The communication protocols used by the telescope management programs, within the physical connection, to transmit commands and data are also numerous and incompatible with each other. For example, one of the best known is the protocol used by the LX200 telescope launched in 1992 by the manufacturer Meade Instruments Corporation; the protocol exists in a number of variants that have been developed over time to account for the evolution of telescopes. An example of this evolution is given by the introduction in the telescope of a GPS (Global Positioning System) receiver which allows the program in the connected computer to detect the position of the telescope on the earth and to take it into account in the calculation of the coordinates towards which the telescope is aimed.

The diversity and incompatibility of communication protocols, combined with the variety of physical connections, require the manufacturers of the telescope management software to make a considerable effort to make the programs compatible with the different existing telescope models; moreover, those who own a telescope are not free to use any management software program, but must choose one that is compatible with their telescope.

The Applicant also pointed out that not only do telescopes sometimes need commands to be executed after a certain delay, either in sequence or again.

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through conditioned jumps.

Through the method described in the patent application RM2013A000728 this was not possible.

Sending commands with immediate execution only slows down and in some cases prevents the execution of complex processes on peripherals, implying constant surveillance by the computer and thus causing a waste of computational resources that could be used for other activities.

The object of the present invention is therefore to describe a method of sending control commands between a computer and a peripheral which allows to solve the drawbacks described above.

A further object of the present invention is that of describing a motorized telescope controlled by a computer which, for the transceiving of at least partially automated orientation data, uses the method which is the object of the present invention.

Summary of the Invention

According to the present invention, a method implemented on a computer for sending control commands between a computer and a peripheral is described, said method being characterized in that:

- said computer performs a step of creating a file for exchanging commands and data realized in a FIFO queue with a plurality of locations for storing commands and data and registers a pair of pointers with a first pointer relating to commands to be inserted in the said FIFO queue and a second pointer relating to commands already stored in said file and to be executed;

- said computer stores on said file a plurality of commands to be executed by increasing the position of the location pointed to by said first pointer by a number equal to the number of locations required by the commands to be memorized

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without requiring a transmission of a command reception capability by said peripheral;

- said computer carrying out a step of transmitting the position of said first pointer and second pointer to said peripheral;

- said peripheral verifying if the second pointer points to a location other than the location pointed to by the first pointer and subsequently loading into its memory, in a command loading and execution step, the command contained in said location pointed to by said second pointer and executing the said command;

- said computer receiving from said peripheral an update of the position of said second pointer by increasing the position of the location pointed to by said pointer.

In one aspect of the present invention, the said method is characterized in that the said peripheral performs a step to increase the location pointed to by said pointer until a configuration is reached in which the location pointed to by said first pointer is identical to the location pointed to by called the second pointer.

In one aspect of the present invention, the said method is characterized in that the said computer stores on said file a wait command, containing a waiting time, and the peripheral, upon execution of the said loading and execution step of commands, does not transmit to said computer the update of the position of said second pointer until said waiting time has elapsed.

In a further aspect of the present invention, the said method is characterized by the fact that the said computer stores on said file a jump command conditioned to a location of the said file not immediately preceding or following the location in which the said command is stored, and in which said command contains at least one numerical value

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relative jump of locations or an absolute numerical value index of the location to which said second pointer must point.

In a further aspect of the present invention, the said method is characterized by the fact that the said computer stores on said file a jump command conditioned to a location of the said file not immediately preceding or following the location or locations in which the said command is stored, and in which said command contains at least addressing relating to a data area of said file or an addressing to a reading of a value contained in the memory of said peripheral and further comprising a step for loading and electronic comparison between the values or references loaded from said data area of said file and / or of said value contained in said memory of said peripheral, and of subsequent updating of the location pointed to by said second pointer in agreement.

In a further aspect of the present invention, the said method is characterized in that the said computer writes into the said file a command for repeating one or more commands stored in turn within the said file and in which the said command, when loaded by said peripheral causes the execution of the repetition of said one or more commands for a number of times equal to the value stored in said repetition command, and a respective update of the location pointed to by said second pointer for a corresponding number of times minus one.

In a further aspect of the present invention, the said method is characterized in that a sequence of operating codes of the commands is obtained by means of a translation of a code written in a high-level language.

According to the present invention, a peripheral device adapted to be controlled by a computer is also provided, the said peripheral being characterized in that it comprises means for reading a file for the exchange of commands and data realized in a FIFO queue stored within the said computer and having a

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plurality of locations for storing a plurality of commands and data, and in which said reading means are configured to read the position of a first and a second pointer generated by said computer on said file, in which said first pointer is relative to commands to be inserted into said FIFO queue and in which said second pointer relates to commands already stored in said file; said peripheral comprising a data processing unit configured to load and execute the commands previously stored within said file after having at least temporarily loaded them into its own memory, and further comprising means for updating said position of said second pointer following execution of a command of said plurality of commands previously stored on said file, and in which said data processing unit is designed to load and execute wait, conditional jump and / or loop commands stored on said file in sequence and in non-acknowledged.

In one aspect of the present invention, the said peripheral is characterized in that it comprises means for writing responses to said commands on said file.

In one aspect of the present invention, said peripheral is in detail a telescope equipped with servomotors controlled in actuation, speed and / or acceleration by said data processing unit in accordance with said commands loaded from said file.

Description of the figures

The invention will now be described with reference to the attached figures in one of its preferred and non-limiting embodiments.

- Figure 1 illustrates a diagram of a computer and a telescope connected to each other by means of a wire connection;

- Figure 2 illustrates a detail of a data and command exchange file;

Figure 3 illustrates a detail of a data and command exchange file with an initialized pointer;

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- Figure 4, Figure 5 and Figure 6 illustrate brief flow diagrams of three different types of control referred to by the present invention.

Detailed description of the invention

As illustrated in the attached figures, a method of sending control commands between a computer 200 and a peripheral 300 which in the case of the present invention is a telescope is described.

An added functionality to the technique described in the patent RM2013A000728 consists in the possibility of creating a queue of commands (or instructions) which are stored inside the data and command exchange file 100, which has a first initial area 500 with a plurality of locations 101 intended to occupy commands and a second area 600 with a plurality of locations intended to occupy data to be transmitted between the computer 200 and the peripheral.

In particular, the said file is a FIFO queue type file.

The computer 200 is configured in such a way as to create said file 100 in a known way and to define a pair of pointers P1, P2 of which a first pointer P1 is appointed to point to the location in which the command to be entered by the computer 200 in file 100 and in which a second pointer P2 instead relates to the commands already stored inside the file 100, commands that are loaded and executed by the peripheral 300.

As illustrated in Figure 2, initially the pointers P1 and P2 are both initialized so as to point to the first useful location of the subsequent command queue, indicated by Cl. When the computer 200 wishes to add a command to the queue, it writes the code of the command to be executed in the location pointed to by PI and then increments the pointer PI by 1 unit. If computer 200 has other commands to add to the queue, it writes each of them to locations

101 successive (C2) and each time it increments the pointer PI by one unit.

As soon as the device 300 is free, it examines the sector and sees that the pointer

PI has a different value from that of P2. From said examination the peripheral includes

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therefore that there are in the queue one or more commands to execute and it reads the first one in the location pointed to by P2, loading the said command in its memory and then executing it.

For each command executed, the peripheral transmits to the computer 200 an update of the position of the second pointer P2, in detail increasing the position of the location 101 pointed to by it by one unit. It can therefore be seen that this organization makes it possible to create a queue of FIFO-type commands quite similar to that described for data in the patent RM2013A000728.

As in that case, when a pointer points to the last location dedicated to storing commands, instead of increasing it, it returns to the first location of the commands. Also in this case there is an empty FIFO queue condition (when P1 = P2) and a full FIFO condition (when P2 = P1-1),

Note that the C1, C2 and subsequent commands can all have the same length, equal to one or more bytes: in the case of a length greater than one byte, the pointers

PI and P2 are not incremented by 1 but by a number equal to the length of the command in progress. Similarly, the commands can have different lengths from each other as long as the first byte of each command, in addition to the numerical code of the command itself, also contains or implies the length in bytes of the command in terms of the number of locations 101 reserved for the command itself. At the time of storage by the computer 200 and execution by the peripheral 300 the corresponding first and respectively second pointer PI,

P2 is incremented by a value equal to the length of the command.

A similar FIFO mechanism can be used to transmit a command response queue from peripheral 300 to computer 200 as they are executed.

Figure 1 shows that the pointers and commands are all within the first sector 500 of the command and data file 100, a sector that is reserved for the presence of commands. In practice it is possible to dedicate any number of leases 101 to

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this function, possibly using, instead of the pointers PI and P2, pairs of pointers in which the first pointer points to sector 500 and the second to location 101 within the sector, in a similar way to what is described in the original patent RM2013A000728.

By means of the command queue it is therefore possible to execute the commands asynchronously, while retaining the possibility of sending to the computer 200 the response given by the peripheral 300 to each of the commands received.

The same mechanism can be created, alternatively or in addition to the one described so far, in the case in which it is the peripheral that sends commands to the computer and the computer sends the replies.

This FIFO organization also for the commands allows to perform a disconnected operation, in which in a first phase the computer 200 stores an entire command session in the file 100, and in a subsequent and second phase the peripheral 300 loads and executes the commands. read from said file 100 and creates any responses. This second phase may be followed by a third phase in which the responses are sent back to the computer 200. The interaction between peripheral 300 and computer 200 therefore has a flexible timing and it is possible to realize a solution with frequent or rare computer-peripheral interaction, up to to arrive at the case of a completely disconnected operation (playback).

As regards the coding of commands, with the organization described in this description, it is possible to store and then execute any type of command, coding each command with a different operating code, optionally followed (according to the type of command) by a or more data.

In other words, it is possible to build a real processing machine with architecture similar to the "Von Neumann" or "Harvard" one. The instructions can be written directly by means of their operating codes or they can be obtained by means of translation from a high-level language such as C or Java.

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The computer 200 and the peripheral 300 connected together thus become a program generator and a machine for executing the programs themselves; the registers and memory locations of the computer can be allocated in the internal RAM memory of the device 300 or inside the data and command exchange file.

As illustrated in Figures 4, 5 and 6, like a processing machine, the commands stored on file 100 can also contain conditional jumps (IF instruction) in which the decision on making the jump is based on the value of a given also contained in the data and command exchange file and addressed by means of its sector number and offset within the sector, or contained in the peripheral RAM and possibly based on the outcome of a previous operation.

In the case of a conditional jump, therefore, the latter takes place at a location 101 of said file 100 which is not immediately preceding or following the location or locations relating to the command in execution, and the conditional jump command contains a numerical value that can be - relative or absolute - equal to the number of locations 101 to jump or to the location to which the second pointer P2 must point either a memory location in the data portion 600 or an addressing to a memory portion of the computer 200 or of the peripheral 300 from which to read data or acknowledgment values for said conditional jump.

Similarly, it is possible to create loops and also enter commands that involve waiting for a time established in the subsequent data or waiting until a certain date / time.

In the case of wait commands, these contain a wait time in seconds or in machine cycles necessary for the peripheral 300 to transmit to the computer 200 an update of the position of the second pointer P2,

Finally, in the case of loop commands, they are specifically

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repetition of a command or of a sequential plurality of commands stored in turn within said file 100, and in which said command, when loaded and executed in peripheral 300, is repeated for a number of times equal to the repetition value stored in the command itself, and Γ update of the position of the second pointer P2 is performed at the starting point for the repetition value stored in the command minus 1.

The latter possibilities find, for example, an application in the astronomical sector as better described in the following example, which presents an example application of the data and command exchange method as described in the patent RM2013A000728 and with the additional functions described in the present invention.

As can be seen in Figure 1, a motorized telescope 300 is connected to a computer 200 by means of an interface cable or an equivalent wireless connection method.

A management program is installed on the computer and is used to manage the telescope. The interface can be of any type suitable for connecting an external mass memory (USB, SCSI, SAS, SATA, Ethernet, Wi-Fi ..), but neither the management software nor the internal firmware of the telescope must be adapted. based on the type of interface used; furthermore, no device software drivers need to be installed on the computer. These characteristics are basic peculiarities of the method described in the patent RM2013A000728 and are also exploited in this case.

From the point of view of the exchange of commands and responses, the organization is instead of the FIFO type object of the present invention.

The management program, based on the settings given by the user, prepares a command queue and inserts it into file 100 using direct commands from the computer

200 towards the telescope. These commands (for example: initialization, preparation of the telescope operating parameters, time synchronization, reading

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position, pointing at a celestial body, tracking based on the Earth's rotation and compensation for tracking errors) are entered one after the other directly in file 100 one after the other in sequence, without having to wait for the outcome of the 'processing or execution of the previous command carried out by peripheral 300. It is therefore a peripheral capable of executing - by means of its own data processing unit of the most convenient type - a sequence of commands previously stored in non-acknowledged mode starting from a sequence of commands previously stored on a FIFO queue file.

The telescope executes the commands stored in file 100, in a sequence in which the execution of each command begins after the end of the previous command and through the process already described above in this description. Then the telescope executes the sequence of commands in a completely similar way to that in which a computer executes the instructions contained in a program one after the other.

There are special cases in which, like a computer program, the execution of commands occurs in a different way from simple succession in sequence. A first case is that of the use of a conditional jump (instruction

IF), which occurs for example in the case in which a command fails for any reason (for example, a positioning cannot be carried out because a motor reaches the end of its stroke). In this case it would be useless for the telescope to continue executing the subsequent commands stored in file 100; therefore the program stored in file 100 foresees, in this case, a jump to a different part of the program that manages the error (for example, by performing a reset and repositioning of the telescope or by warning the user).

In other words, with the stored program method, the telescope 300 autonomously performs a series of operations which, in the previous technique, EDP / 205pl5

they were followed one by one by the management program. The main advantage of the technique lies in the fact that the program operates with higher level commands that can be more standardized, therefore less dependent on the brand and model of telescope.

Another advantage lies in the fact that the commands can be accumulated with the computer connected to the telescope and carried out later with the telescope disconnected from the computer, without therefore having to have the computer 200 near the telescope and without the problem of light emitted from the screen. Of computer.

Another example of exploitation of the innovative characteristics of the technique described here is in the possibility of inserting timings (wait) in the sequence of commands. One of the functions offered by the management programs is to program a “tour”, in which the telescope positions itself in sequence, with predetermined times, towards a series of different celestial bodies that you want to observe. After positioning itself on a body, the telescope waits for a predetermined time during which it only provides for tracking, and then positions itself on the next body.

The “tour” can be programmed, all at once, by downloading a sequence of commands from the computer to the telescope; it will be performed by the telescope, with the established timings, even when the computer is disconnected.

The application of the method, illustrated so far with reference to the astronomical field, is advantageous in any field of technique; to illustrate the use of the "loop" programmed in the command file, for example, you can enter the field of industrial robotics.

If a robotic arm has to perform the same operation 100 times, such as moving a piece by grabbing it and depositing it in another position, instead of repeating the same commands 100 times, it is possible to insert them only once in file 100 within a loop to be performed 100 times.

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As can be seen from the examples given in the description, the method has advantages that can be exploited in any field of technology in which there is communication between a computer and a peripheral.

Finally, it is clear that additions, modifications or obvious variants for a person skilled in the art can be applied to the object of the present invention without thereby departing from the scope of protection provided by the attached claims.

Claims (10)

Claims 1. Method implemented on a computer for sending control commands between a computer (200) and a peripheral (300), said method being characterized in that: - the said computer performs a step of creating a file (100) for exchanging commands and data realized in a FIFO queue with a plurality of locations (101) for storing commands and data and registers a pair of pointers (PI, P2 ) with a first pointer (PI) relating to commands to be inserted in said FIFO queue and a second pointer (P2) relating to commands already stored in said file (100) and to be executed; - said computer stores on said file (100) a plurality of commands to be executed by increasing the position of the location (101) pointed to by said first pointer (PI) by a number equal to the number of locations (101) required by the commands to be stored without requesting a transmission of a command reception capability by said peripheral (300); - said computer executing a step of transmitting the position of said first pointer and second pointer (PI, P2) to said peripheral (300); - the said peripheral verifying if the second pointer (P2) points to a location (101) different from the location (101) pointed to by the first pointer (PI) and subsequently loading into its memory, in a command loading and execution step, the command contained in said location (101) pointed to by said second pointer (P2) and executing said command; - said computer receiving from said peripheral an update of the position of said second pointer (P2) by increasing the position of the location (101) pointed to by said pointer (P2). 2. Method implemented on a computer for sending control commands between a computer (200) and a peripheral (300) according to claim 1, characterized in that the said peripheral (300) performs a step to increase the location (101) pointed by said pointer (P2) until reaching a configuration in which the location (101) pointed to by said first pointer (PI) is identical to the location (101) pointed to by said second pointer (P2). Method implemented on a computer for sending control commands between a computer (200) and a peripheral (300) according to claim 1 or claim 2, characterized in that said computer (200) stores on said file (100) a waiting command, containing a waiting time, and the peripheral, upon executing the said step of loading and executing commands, does not transmit to the said computer (200) the update of the position of the said second pointer (P2 ) as long as the said waiting time has not elapsed. 4. Method implemented on a computer for sending control commands between a computer (200) and a peripheral according to claim 1 or claim 2, characterized in that said computer (200) stores on said file (100) a jump command conditioned to a location (101) of the said file (100) not immediately preceding or following the location (101) or locations (101) in which the said command is stored, and in which the said command contains at least one relative numerical value of jump of locations (101) or an absolute numerical value index of the location (101) to which said second pointer (P2) must point. 5. Method implemented on a computer for sending control commands between a computer (200) and a peripheral according to claim 4, characterized in that said computer (200) stores on said file (100) a conditional jump command to a location (101) of the said file (100) not immediately preceding or following the location (101) or locations (101) in which the said command is stored, and in which the said command contains at least addressing relating to a zone data (600) of said file (100) or an address to a reading of a value contained in the memory of said peripheral (300) and further comprising an electronic loading and comparison step between the values or references loaded from said data area (600 ) of said file (100) and / or of said value contained in said memory of said peripheral, and of subsequent updating of the location (101) pointed to by said second pointer (P2) in agreement. 6. Method implemented on a computer for sending control commands between a computer (200) and a peripheral (300) according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the said computer (200) writes a command into said file (100) repetition of one or more commands stored in turn within said file (100) and in which said command, when loaded from said peripheral (200) causes the repetition of said one or more commands for a number of times equal to the value stored in said repeat command, and a respective update of the location pointed to by said second pointer (P2) for a corresponding number of times minus one. 7. Method implemented on a computer for sending control commands between a computer (200) and a peripheral (300) according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that a sequence of operating codes of the commands is obtained by means of a translation of a code written in a high level language. 8. Peripheral (300) adapted to be controlled by a computer (200), said peripheral being characterized in that it comprises means for reading a file (100) for exchanging commands and data realized in a FIFO queue stored within said computer ( 200) and having a plurality of locations (101) for storing a plurality of commands and data, and in which said reading means are configured to read the position of a first and a second pointer (PI, P2) generated by said computer (200) on said file, in which said first pointer (PI) relates to commands to be inserted into said queue F1FO and in which said second pointer (P2) relates to commands already stored in said file (100); the said peripheral comprising a data processing unit configured to load and execute the commands previously stored within the said file (100) after having at least temporarily loaded them into its own memory, and further comprising means for updating the said position of the said second pointer ( P2) following the execution of a command of said plurality of commands previously stored on said file (100), and in which said data processing unit is designed to load and execute wait, conditional jump and / or loop commands stored on said file (100) in sequence and in non-acknowledged mode. 9. Peripheral according to claim 8, characterized in that it comprises means for writing responses to said commands on said file (100). 10. Peripheral according to any one of claims 8 or 9, characterized in that it is a telescope equipped with servomotors controlled in actuation, speed and / or acceleration by said data processing unit in accordance with said commands loaded from said file (100).