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[netcat]

@Substring Can you please check out revised version of Diagram, I am prone to doing stupid mistakes this week, I believe it is all good now.

Thank you

[supernature2k]

@netcat

Yep, all good now.

Please make a new post in the correct section so we can pin it!

[Substring]

@netcat first i'd need some documentation or at least some code examples on how to send data to the betabrite, whether a specific driver has to be added to the os first or it works straight like usb.

[netcat]

@Substring although nowadays there are Betabrites that attach directly to the USB port, they are exceedingly difficult to come by, your classic Betabrite sign will attach to a serial (COM port), which I believe can be emulated through the GPIO ? Many years ago a spent considerable time catching data form serial ports and figuring out how to send messages to Betabrite signs, even wrote a couple programs in Qbasic as I recall to accomplish this task, once correct strings were determined on how to send messages I forwarded this info to a number of people in the arcade community (much better programmers than myself) whom implemented it in various ways.

I will dig out the information, but the first question is does the raspberry Pi have means to communicate through standard Serial interface (Not USB) ?

HERE is my original program from 2005 designed to generate Individual ASCII files for each mame game (which were all placed in an LCD Directory and called upon before running each game)

CLS
PRINT ""
PRINT "* BETABRITE/MAME LCD FILE GENERATOR *"
PRINT ""
PRINT "* "
PRINT " Version: 1.0 "
PRINT " Author : Tony Jimenez "
PRINT " E-mail : Tony@780tech.com "
PRINT " *"
PRINT "*****************************************************************************"
PRINT
PRINT " Application MUST be run from INSIDE the MAME folder"
PRINT
PRINT " Would you like <D>ynamic sign or <S>tatic sign"

1 a$ = INKEY$
IF a$ = "" THEN GOTO 1
IF UCASE$(a$) = "S" THEN GOSUB 4000 ELSE GOSUB 5000

PRINT
PRINT " Making LCD Directory"
PRINT
PRINT " AN Extended Error 183 indicates the folder ALREADY exists"
PRINT
SHELL " MD LCD"
PRINT
PRINT ""
PRINT
PRINT " GENERATING GAMELIST.TXT"
PRINT
PRINT " A BAD COMMAND OR FILE NAME Error indicates you are NOT in MAME folder"
PRINT
SHELL "mame -listfull > gamelist.txt"
PRINT
PRINT ""

item = 0

OPEN "GAMELIST.TXT" FOR INPUT AS #2: INPUT #2, text$

REM PRINT TEXT$

10
REM *****************
REM CYCLE BEGINS HERE
REM *****************

LINE INPUT #2, text$

name$ = ""

FOR a = 1 TO LEN(text$)
IF MID$(text$, a, 1) <> " " THEN name$ = name$ + MID$(text$, a, 1) ELSE GOTO 1000
NEXT

1000

desc$ = ""
a = a + 1
IF MID$(text$, a, 1) = " " THEN GOTO 1000
FOR b = (a + 1) TO (LEN(text$) - 1)
desc$ = desc$ + MID$(text$, b, 1)
NEXT
REM PRINT "Description : "; desc$

name$ = "lcd" + name$ + ".lcd"
REM PRINT name$
OPEN name$ FOR OUTPUT AS #3
desc$ = PF$ + desc$ + SF$
PRINT #3, desc$

CLOSE #3

item = item + 1
LOCATE 35, 3: PRINT "Processing Item #"; item

IF EOF(2) <> -1 THEN PRINT : GOTO 10

END

4000 REM STATIC SIGN
PF$ = CHR$(112)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(81)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(232)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(192)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(143)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(156)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(197)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(1)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(88)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(120)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(181)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(1)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(1)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(90)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(48)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(48)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(2)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(65)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(65)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(27)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(32)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(98)

SF$ = CHR$(4)
RETURN

5000 REM DYNAMIC SIGN
PF$ = CHR$(112)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(81)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(232)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(192)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(143)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(156)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(197)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(1)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(88)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(120)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(181)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(1)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(1)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(90)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(48)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(48)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(2)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(65)
PF$ = PF$ + CHR$(65)

SF$ = CHR$(4)
SF$ = SF$ + CHR$(114)
SF$ = SF$ + CHR$(14)
SF$ = SF$ + CHR$(64)
SF$ = SF$ + CHR$(27)
SF$ = SF$ + CHR$(8)
RETURN

[netcat]

@Substring This is the Diagram I put together back then on how to interface through the serial port

http://www.780tech.com/betabrite.GIF

[Substring]

@netcat there are some usb cables to emulate a good old serial com, so that would be the best start

Googling "betabrite python" shows some people already did the job in python, so i guess it could be not that hard, if all planets align perfectly

[netcat]

@supernature2k HAte to continue sounding dumb but in this site I have no idea how to make a new post, I believe originally I replied to a previously made post ?

[netcat]

@Substring quite a bit of articles talking about adding a standard serial port to your Pi

Only concern is it looks like it yses some if not all of the same pins as the power/reset buttons and LED

http://www.davidhunt.ie/add-a-9-pin-serial-port-to-your-raspberry-pi-in-10-minutes/

[Substring]

@netcat and i still believe some "usb rs232" cable is the easiest way to go

[netcat]

@Substring I am certainly ok with this option

[netcat]

Found a copy of my original artice for BetaBrite signs here:

https://web.archive.org/web/20141105153358/http://www.780tech.com/betabrite/index.htm
@Substring if you are interested in taking on this poroject drop me an email at 780tech@gmail.com and I can arrange to ship you a BetaBrite sign and we can choose out and purchase the usb to serial adapter of your choice

Tony