in reply to Data adquisition from a USB device

I wish I could provide more help, but Device::USB only provides access to the USB library. In order to actually interface with a device, you need to know something about the protocol the device uses.

I only know of two ways to get that:

The first option is the best if you can do it. If you have to go the sniffer route, you can do a web search for USB sniffer and find lots of options.

If you can get the protocol information, using Device::USB is not too terribly hard. If you need further help, you can email the author of the module. He's a nice enough guy and can be helpful, even though he usually doesn't know much about any particular device.

G. Wade

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Re^2: Data adquisition from a USB device
by flope004 (Acolyte) on Apr 11, 2009 at 02:38 UTC

    Thanks for the quick reply!
    I don't think I can identify the protocol, though.
    How many different protocols can we expect?
    I couldn't find anything in the documentation.
    So, I used an USB sniffer (usbTrace for windows) and I captured one of the biggest packages received.
    I though you were the author 

    --------- Request # 2380 ----[IN]----

URB_FUNCTION_BULK_OR_INTERRUPT_TRANSFER

IRP: 0x87079008
Status: STATUS_SUCCESS (0x0)
Device Object: 0x89947340



Length: 0x48
USBD Status: USBD_STATUS_SUCCESS (0x0)
EndpointAddress: 0x81
PipeHandle: 0x88D24094
TransferFlags: 0x3 ( USBD_TRANSFER_DIRECTION_IN USBD_SHORT_TRANSFER_OK
+ )
TransferBufferLength: 0xD1
TransferBuffer: 0x875B9000
TransferBufferMDL: 0x88A877C8
UrbLink: 0x0

** Data **
01 60 C7 76 C5 C4 B7 FE 33 FF 39 FF 98 FF C2 FF BF FF B6 FF 45 FF 33 F
+F 03 FF D7 FE 0D FF F9 FE 28 FF 6D FF 94 FF AE FF C7 FF BD FF 99 FF 3
+B FF 32 FF DC FE 15 FF 48 FF 96 FF BD FF 0E FF F8 FE 01 60 AF FF C1 F
+F C7 FF 6B FF 26 FF 17 FF 02 FF F0 FE 79 FF 98 FF B3 FF A8 FF 72 FF 0
+F FF 8F FF 01 FF 99 FF A4 FF 45 FF 46 FF 1C FF BE FE 2F FF 41 FF 83 F
+F B2 FF AE FF A2 FF 16 FF 09 FF 46 FF 01 60 2B FF 64 FF 9B FF A9 FF B
+C FF B7 FF 3B FF 27 FF F4 FE E1 E1 FE 54 FF 37 FF 96 FF BA FF B8 FF D
+2 FE CD FE 97 FF BA FF B0 FF 58 FF 2C FF 03 FF 08 FF 13 FF 75 FF 92 F
+F B8 FF B9 FF 3E FF 0A 01 60 FF 8E FF 57 FF 18 FF 6D FF 88 FF 9F FF B
+7 FD

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[d/l]

      Unfortunately, there may be two different types of documentation: user docs and programmer docs. You need the programmer docs. Those are usually a bit harder to come by.

      From the information you have provided, it looks like the you could probably use the Device::USB::Device::bulk_read method. Unfortunately, without the docs, you have quite a bit of reverse-engineering to make sense of the data in that packet.

      Honestly, it would definitely be worth your time to check with the company to see if they have any programming documentation. Debugging a binary protocol is not always the best use of time.

      I though you were the author

      I am. That was supposed to be a little joke. (It turned out to be even smaller than expected.<shrug/>)

      G. Wade
[reply]
[d/l]

        I though it was a joke
        Thanks for your help. As you said I don't have the time for reverse engineering.
        I though that, once one gets to mimic the communication between the device and the driver, interpreting the income data was easier.
        I will try to get the technical documentation and see.
        Thanks,
        F

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