AdrianBowyer/RepRapLtd-engineering — Issue #1: Some setup issues
Author: jbayless
Created: 2012-02-20 05:27:26+00:00
State: open

Hi,

I've encountered some issues while setting up Adrian Bowyer's Java Host Sprinter firmware.

I have RAMPS 1.4, I'm running Windows 7 (64-bit) with 32-bit Java in Eclipse.

I've set up Java Host on my machine in Eclipse so that I can spy on the serial transmissions in debug mode (I just put system.out.println commands where it reads and writes to the serial port) to see what RAMPS and Host are saying to each other.

Previously this weekend I was experimenting with Teacup and encountered some [other issues](http://forums.reprap.org/read.php?146,119613). Then I noticed that the Host Software guide in the Mendel user manual [recommends only two firmwares](url=http://reprap.org/wiki/Mendel_User_Manual:_Host_Software#Firmware), FiveD and Java Host Sprinter. Java Host Sprinter does not appear on the [list of firmwares](http://reprap.org/wiki/List_of_Firmware#Sprinter).

I decided to try Java Host Sprinter on my RAMPS electronics. The first thing I noticed was that I could find no install instructions except for [these](url=https://github.com/AdrianBowyer/RepRapLtd-engineering/tree/master/Production-firmware/Sprinter) instructions specifically for Sanguino electronics in Ubuntu. I decided not to let that stop me and pressed onward, but I note that if this is going to be a viable official firmware option, it should have more thorough and/or generic installation instructions.

The next issue I encountered, while unzipping the folder, is "identical" files in the /Sprinter_ab/ folder:
configuration.h
Configuration.h
configuration.h.dist
Configuration.h.dist

Windows, unlike Linux, treats filenames as case-insensitive so it asked which one I wanted to overwrite the other. I ran a dif on configuration.h and Configuration.h to compare them, and decided that the lower-case file looked like the more recent one, so I used that one.

In /Sprinter_ab/configuration.h, I set #define MOTHERBOARD 3 for RAMPS, although it's not clear which version of RAMPS this is compatible with.

The instructions in the readme say to upload /Sprinter/Sprinter.pde. But I assume that it actually intends for me to upload /Sprinter_ab/Sprinter_ab.pde, so I uploaded this to my RAMPS arduino instead.

I then loaded up RepRap Host in Eclipse, and ran it in debug mode to watch the communications. Here's what is printed to the console:

Stable Library
=========================================
Native lib Version = RXTX-2.1-7
Java lib Version = RXTX-2.1-7
Host says: M110
Sprinter says: start
Sprinter says:

... And the code halts here and nothing else happens. Sprinter is supposed to say "ok" at this point. Teacup did. But it never gets any farther than this, so the Host GUI never appears.

Does anyone know what might be going wrong?

Jacob