Serial Port Assistant

Author: Kang Lin (kl222@126.com)

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🇨🇳 中文

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Introduction

• Project position:

  • Main repository: https://github.com/KangLin/SerialPortAssistant
  • Mirrory repository:
    • https://launchpad.net/serialportassistant
    • https://gitlab.com/kl222/SerialPortAssistant
    • https://sourceforge.net/projects/serialportassistant/
    • https://gitee.com/kl222/SerialPortAssistant
    • https://bitbucket.org/kl222/serialportassistant

• Project home

• This project is a cross-platform serial port assistant. It can run on:

  • WINDOWS
  • linux
  • Android
  • macOS
    • macOS, I don't have the corresponding equipment, please compile and test the user with the corresponding equipment.
    • Currently compiles successfully. but the loading dynamic library path is not set correctly. Please help you set it.

  See: Qt5 supported platforms, Qt6 supported platforms.

• Multi-language

  • Chinese

    

  • Englisth

    

• Multi style

Download

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Donate

If you are satisfied, you can donate to me

If it cannot be displayed, please open:

• https://gitlab.com/kl222/RabbitCommon/-/raw/master/Src/Resource/image/Contribute.png
• https://sourceforge.net/p/rabbitcommon/code/ci/master/tree/Src/Resource/image/Contribute.png

Developer

Dependence

• Qt (LGPL v2.1)

• RabbitCommon: https://github.com/KangLin/RabbitCommon
  It can be downloaded to the same directory of the project. If it is a different directory, set the environment variable RabbitCommon_ROOT

    git clone https://github.com/KangLin/RabbitCommon.git
  

Compile

• Download source code

    git clone https://github.com/KangLin/SerialPortAssistant.git
  

• Compiled with QtCreator

  • Open the project file CMakeLists.txt with QtCreator
  • The RabbitCommon can be downloaded to the same directory of the project. If it is a different directory, Set the parameter RabbitCommon_ROOT
  • Direct compilation can generate programs

• Compile with the command line

  • Download source code and the deplendence in same directory

    git clone https://github.com/KangLin/RabbitCommon.git
    git clone https://github.com/KangLin/SerialPortAssistant.git
    

  • Make the build directory in the project root directory

    cd SerialPortAssistant
    mkdir build
    cd build
    # cmake configure
    cmake .. -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=`pwd`/install [-DRabbitCommon_ROOT=...]
    # compiling
    cmake --build . --config Release --target install
    cd install  # The program is installed in the install/bin directory
    

Script

• build_debpackage.sh

  • This script generates the deb package under linux. Before use, please make sure the following programs are installed

    sudo apt-get install debhelper fakeroot build-essential cmake
    

  • Use system qt

    • qt6

      sudo apt-get install \
        qt6-tools-dev qt6-tools-dev-tools qt6-base-dev qt6-base-dev-tools \
        qt6-l10n-tools qt6-translations-l10n qt6-scxml-dev \
        qt6-webengine-dev qt6-webengine-dev-tools libqt6serialport6-dev
      

    See: ubuntu.yml

    • qt5

      sudo apt-get install qttools5-dev qttools5-dev-tools \
          qtbase5-dev qtbase5-dev-tools qttranslations5-l10n \
          libqt5scxml5-dev libqt5svg5-dev libqt5serialport5-dev \
          qtwebengine5-dev qtwebengine5-dev-tools qtwebengine5-private-dev
      

• build_appimage.sh

  build AppImage. See: https://github.com/linuxdeploy/linuxdeploy/

• deploy.sh: This script is used to generate new release version numbers and tag. Used only by the program publisher.

Test

• On Linux
  • Set access permissions for the serial port.

    • Check which group the serial port belongs to and its access permissions

      $ ls -la /dev/ttyS*
      crw-rw---- 1 root dialout 4, 65 Aug  4 16:04 /dev/ttyS1
      

    • Add the current user to the group that owns the serial port ( recommended)

      sudo usermod -a -G dialout $USER
      

    • Or give the current user permission to access the needed serial port (not recommended)

       $ sudo chown $USER:dialout /dev/ttyS1
      

    • If the serial port access permissions are not set, you need to run the program as root

      $ sudo serialportassistant
      

    • Test with a virtual serial port locally

      • Install socat

        # eg: ubuntu
        $ sudo apt update
        $ sudo apt install socat
        

      • Create a pair of virtual serial ports

        $ sudo socat -d -d pty,raw,echo=0 pty,raw,echo=0
        

        After running, it will display:

        2025/12/03 14:09:27 socat[31902] N PTY is /dev/pts/5
        2025/12/03 14:09:27 socat[31902] N PTY is /dev/pts/6
        2025/12/03 14:09:27 socat[31902] N starting data transfer loop with FDs [5,5] and [7,7]
        

        • Create symbolic links (optional, for better naming).

          $ sudo ln -sf /dev/pts/2 /dev/ttyVCOM0
          $ sudo ln -sf /dev/pts/3 /dev/ttyVCOM1
          

      • The above two steps can be combined into the following command.

        $ sudo socat -d -d pty,link=/dev/ttyVCOM0,raw,echo=0 pty,link=/dev/ttyVCOM1,raw,echo=0 
        

      • You can now use this program to open the serial port. /dev/pts/5(/dev/ttyVCOM0) and　/dev/pts/6(/dev/ttyVCOM1).
        Because these serial port names are non-standard, this program cannot find them. You can enter the following in the "Serial Port" field: /dev/pts/5
        Because the virtual serial port was created with root privileges, this program also needs to be run with root privileges.

        $ sudo serialportassistant
        

        Alternatively, authorize the serial port to the current user:

        $ sudo chown $USER:tty /dev/pts/5
        $ sudo chown $USER:tty /dev/pts/6
        $ serialportassistant