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serial communication with cell phone — Parallax Forums

serial communication with cell phone

jeffwhitemanjeffwhiteman Posts: 3
edited 2009-04-03 21:08 in BASIC Stamp
First let me introduce myself. My name is Jeff and I am new to the microcontroller world. I work for myself doing sales, installation,and service of automotive electronics.(unfortunately business is slow at the moment) I have an associates degree in EE. (12+ years ago)and have forgotten most of what I learned. I think I retained just enough to be considered dangerous! I have done a ton of reading on this site (you guys are great!) as well as various other sites in the internet abyss. My first (and only) project was to integrate a prepaid cell phone with a BS2. I was able to successfully construct a circuit to decode the DTMF from a call to lock, unlock, and start my vehicle. I was initially very pleased with myself.....naturally as you all know.......its never enough! What I would like to do now is connect the prepaid phone to the stamp and use SMS instead DTMF. This will allow for confirmation messages as well as GPS tracking (to come later). I know the GSM module is probably the way to go but they are much more expensive (only 10.00 for prepaid motorola phone) I have already figured out the AT commands and successfully controlled the phone using a usb cable to my pc and hyperterminal. If I havent lost you yet with my long winded paragragh, heres my question. Is it possible to connect the usb cable from my motorola w175 phone to the bs2? if so how? will it need drivers? This may seem like a dumb question but I am confused. Thanks for any help you can offer.

Jeff

Comments

  • Mike GreenMike Green Posts: 23,101
    edited 2009-04-02 15:52
    No, you can't do it.

    The phone is a USB slave device and the BS2 is also a USB slave device (if you've got a USB to serial adapter). Two slave devices cannot communicate with each other.

    It might be possible to use the Parallax USB Memory Stick Datalogger as a USB host for the BS2 to talk to the Motorola phone. It depends on how the phone is set up. The Datalogger uses a Vinculum chip from FTDI and this can talk to FTDI's USB to serial adapter chips. You may be able to use it to talk to the phone via a virtual serial link, but there are no guarantees and there's very little documentation or experience in doing this.
  • jeffwhitemanjeffwhiteman Posts: 3
    edited 2009-04-02 16:19
    Thanks for the prompt reply. I understand the "No" part but I dont fully understand the explanation.What if I use another phone that has bluetooth, would I be able to use the parallax bluetooth transciever?
  • jeffwhitemanjeffwhiteman Posts: 3
    edited 2009-04-03 20:46
    Mike, I had a chance to read up a bit on the datalogger and it appears to be worth testing. Have you had a chance to reflect on the question of using the bluetooth device as a viable solution?
  • Mike GreenMike Green Posts: 23,101
    edited 2009-04-03 21:08
    There's nothing to reflect upon. It's possible it might work and it's possible it might not work. The details depend on information about the phone's implementation of Bluetooth that I don't have. I also don't know the little details about the Vinculum's implementation of the host protocol for the virtual serial channel. It makes sense that it might work with other Bluetooth serial adapters than FTDI's own and that they claim only that it will work with theirs because they make it and can test and verify that it works with their own device and they don't have to deal with other manufacturer's devices and the immense support problems that would entail.
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