Bits per Second (bps) is the rate at which data is transmitted.
An example of a Data Terminal Equipment (DTE) is a computer.
An example of a Data Communications Equipment (DTE) is a modem.
The original standard for hardware serial communications. It is now usually referred to as TIA-232.
When talking about communications data rates, this section does not use the term “baud”. Baud refers to the number of electrical state transitions that may be made in a period of time, while bps is the correct term to use.
To connect a modem or serial terminal to a FreeBSD system, a serial port on the computer and the proper cable to connect to the serial device are needed. Users who are already familiar with serial hardware and cabling can safely skip this section.
There are several different kinds of serial cables. The two most common types are null-modem cables and standard RS-232 cables. The documentation for the hardware should describe the type of cable required.
A null-modem cable passes some signals, such as “Signal Ground”, straight through, but switches other signals. For example, the “Transmitted Data” pin on one end goes to the “Received Data” pin on the other end.
A null-modem cable can be constructed for use with terminals. The following table shows the RS-232C signal names and the pin numbers on a DB-25 connector. While the standard calls for a straight-through pin 1 to pin 1 Protective Ground line, it is often omitted. Some terminals work using only pins 2, 3, and 7, while others require different configurations than the examples shown below.
| Signal | Pin # | Pin # | Signal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SG | 7 | connects to | 7 | SG |
| TD | 2 | connects to | 3 | RD |
| RD | 3 | connects to | 2 | TD |
| RTS | 4 | connects to | 5 | CTS |
| CTS | 5 | connects to | 4 | RTS |
| DTR | 20 | connects to | 6 | DSR |
| DTR | 20 | connects to | 8 | DCD |
| DSR | 6 | connects to | 20 | DTR |
| DCD | 8 | connects to | 20 | DTR |
The next two tables show two other common schemes.
| Signal | Pin # | Pin # | Signal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| RD | 2 | connects to | 3 | TD |
| TD | 3 | connects to | 2 | RD |
| DTR | 4 | connects to | 6 | DSR |
| DTR | 4 | connects to | 1 | DCD |
| SG | 5 | connects to | 5 | SG |
| DSR | 6 | connects to | 4 | DTR |
| DCD | 1 | connects to | 4 | DTR |
| RTS | 7 | connects to | 8 | CTS |
| CTS | 8 | connects to | 7 | RTS |
| Signal | Pin # | Pin # | Signal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| RD | 2 | connects to | 2 | TD |
| TD | 3 | connects to | 3 | RD |
| DTR | 4 | connects to | 6 | DSR |
| DTR | 4 | connects to | 8 | DCD |
| SG | 5 | connects to | 7 | SG |
| DSR | 6 | connects to | 20 | DTR |
| DCD | 1 | connects to | 20 | DTR |
| RTS | 7 | connects to | 5 | CTS |
| CTS | 8 | connects to | 4 | RTS |
When one pin at one end connects to a pair of pins at the other end, it is usually implemented with one short wire between the pair of pins in their connector and a long wire to the other single pin.
The above designs seem to be the most popular. In another variation, SG connects to SG, TD connects to RD, RTS and CTS connect to DCD, DTR connects to DSR, and vice-versa.
Serial ports are the devices through which data is transferred between the FreeBSD host computer and the terminal. This section describes the kinds of ports that exist and how they are addressed in FreeBSD.
Several kinds of serial ports exist. Before purchasing or constructing a cable, make sure it will fit the ports on the terminal and on the FreeBSD system.
Most terminals have DB-25 ports. Personal computers may have DB-25 or DB-9 ports. A multiport serial card may have RJ-12 or RJ-45 ports.
See the documentation that accompanied the hardware for specifications on the kind of port or visually verify the type of port.
In FreeBSD, each serial port is accessed through an
entry in /dev.
There are two different kinds of entries:
Call-in ports are named
/dev/ttyu
where NN is the port number,
starting from zero. Generally, the call-in port is
used for terminals. Call-in ports require that the
serial line assert the Data Carrier Detect
(DCD) signal to work
correctly.
Call-out ports are named
/dev/cuau.
Call-out ports are usually not used for terminals, but
are used for modems. The call-out port can be used if
the serial cable or the terminal does not support the
carrier detect signal.N
If a terminal is connected to the first serial
port(COM1), use
/dev/ttyu0 to refer to the
terminal. If the terminal is on the second serial port
(COM2), use
/dev/ttyu1, and so forth.
FreeBSD supports four serial ports by default. In the
MS-DOS® world, these are known as
COM1,
COM2,
COM3, and
COM4. FreeBSD currently supports
“dumb” multiport serial interface cards, such as
the BocaBoard 1008 and 2016, as well as more intelligent
multi-port cards such as those made by Digiboard and Stallion
Technologies. However, the default kernel only looks for the
standard COM ports.
To see if the kernel recognizes the serial ports,
watch for messages while the kernel is booting, or use
/sbin/dmesg to replay the kernel's
boot messages. Look for messages that start with the
characters uart:
# /sbin/dmesg | grep 'uart'If the kernel does not recognize all of the serial
ports, configure /boot/device.hints.
When editing this file, one can comment out or completely
remove lines for devices that do not exist on the
system.
port IO_COM1 is a substitution for
port 0x3f8, IO_COM2 is
0x2f8, IO_COM3 is
0x3e8, and IO_COM4 is
0x2e8. These are fairly common port
addresses for their respective serial ports and interrupts
4, 3, 5, and 9 are fairly common interrupt request lines.
Regular serial ports cannot share
interrupts on ISA-bus PCs. Multiport boards have
on-board electronics that allow all the 16550A's on the
board to share one or two interrupt request lines.
Most devices in the kernel are accessed through
“device special files” which are located in
/dev. The
sio devices are accessed through the
/dev/ttyu
(dial-in) and
N/dev/cuau
(call-out) devices. FreeBSD also provides initialization
devices
(N/dev/ttyu
and
N.init/dev/cuau)
and locking devices
(N.init/dev/ttyu
and
N.lock/dev/cuau).
The initialization devices are used to initialize
communications port parameters each time a port is opened,
such as N.lockcrtscts for modems which use
RTS/CTS signaling for flow control. The
locking devices are used to lock flags on ports to prevent
users or programs changing certain parameters. Refer to
termios(4), sio(4), and stty(1) for
information on terminal settings, locking and initializing
devices, and setting terminal options, respectively.
The
ttyu (or
Ncuau)
is the regular device to open for applications. When a
process opens the device, it will have a default set of
terminal I/O settings. These settings can be viewed with the
command:N
# stty -a -f /dev/ttyu1When the settings are changed for a device, the settings
are in effect until the device is closed. When the device is
reopened, it goes back to the default set. To permanently
change the default set, open and adjust the settings of the
“initial state” device. For example, to turn on
CLOCAL mode, 8 bit communication, and
XON/XOFF flow control for
ttyu5, type:
# stty -f /dev/ttyu5.init clocal cs8 ixon ixoffSystem-wide initialization of serial devices is
controlled by /etc/rc.d/serial. This
file affects the default settings of serial devices.
To prevent certain settings from being changed by an
application, make adjustments to the “lock state”
device. For example, to lock the speed of
ttyu5 to 57600 bps, type:
# stty -f /dev/ttyu5.lock 57600Now, an application that opens
ttyu5 and tries to change the speed
of the port will be stuck with 57600 bps.
The initial state and lock state devices should only be
writable by root.
All FreeBSD documents are available for download at http://ftp.FreeBSD.org/pub/FreeBSD/doc/
Questions that are not answered by the
documentation may be
sent to <freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.org>.
Send questions about this document to <freebsd-doc@FreeBSD.org>.