how to use Terminal with KeySpan USB serial adaptor cable?

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Level 1

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how to use Terminal with KeySpan USB serial adaptor cable?

I own a KeySpan model USA-19HS to use with our MacBookPro when working on clients networking equipment that require serial communication. I have used ZTerm with excellent luck, but it costs, and is yet another application that I dont really want. I would like to know if any one out there has exacing instructions on how to use Terminal with this adaptor. If I could write a file that had, say, the couple most common settings (9600-8-n-1, 57600-8-n-1, et cetera) that I could simply click on, to open a new Terminal window with those settings, then simply close that, and open a new window (apple+n) in order to get back to a default settings terminal window. All feedback is most appreciated.

Thanks so much, Jason Sjobeck

mbp15, Mac OS X (10.4.8)

Posted on Feb 3, 2007 11:25 PM

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Answer 1

Dr. Smoke

Level 9

56,586 points

Feb 4, 2007 1:43 AM in response to sjobeck_

Hi, Jason. Welcome to the Discussions.

You wrote:

"All feedback is most appreciated."

OK. 😉

1. Have you considered discussing this with Keyspan Support?

2. Have you read the section "OSX has Terminal.app - why do I need ZTerm?" on the ZTerm Home Page? That seems to explain why one needs an app like ZTerm.

3. A quick search of Keyspan's FAQ for your product and terminal doesn't yield much more than how to find the serial ports using Terminal.

Likewise, this Google search also yields little, and variants of that search of such weren't particularly help either.

It appears your inquiry seems to be a somewhat esoteric topic.

4. Apparently, ZTerm X is a bit long in the tooth and there's no Universal Binary for it. It sounds, however, like you've tried it running on your MBP under Rosetta, yes?

5. In researching alternatives to ZTerm for you, I note the followng:

• The comment from "Reverb" on this page suggests C-Kermit or Kermit as a free alternative.

• This tip on Mac OS X Hints cites Minicom as another option.

6. You may want to try your question on the Unix Discussion.

Good luck!

😉 Dr. Smoke
Author: Troubleshooting Mac® OS X

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Answer 2

Mar 20, 2007 12:05 AM in response to sjobeck_

Jason, alas, the Terminal application seems to support only connections to the local shell of your Macintosh - or to other network devices, not direct serial connections. The interface looks like it could support this (See the "Connect to server" command under file - don't you wish there was a Local Serial Port option there?) but unless you add a usb port based tty and a script that connects you to that, it doesn't look like there is a pre-done easy solution.

You can use a unix based terminal emulator (perhaps under X11) or the method you are using now, ZTerm. Unfortunately there seem to be no really up-to-date (read "good looking") terminal emulation programs that work on serial ports available for Tiger and later. There are programs available (MacWise, DataComet to name two, Versaterm also) but most seem to be rather old in the tooth interface wise. This is not to say they don't run and do the job, but nothing seems to look as good as Terminal, say.

Of course, I might be missing something, in which case I hope someone corrects me as I've been looking for the same thing.

PowerBook G4 and others Mac OS X (10.4.3)

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