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HP Forum Archive 06

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HP42S Infrarred Ouput
Message #1 Posted by Ex-PPC member on 21 Sept 2001, 6:09 p.m.

Hi again, I know that the HP42S is capable of infrarred ouput to a printer, and I guess this should include program listings. The question is, ¿ is there any freeware software for pc/win98 which runs on a laptop with infrarred input capability and is able to accept and store (in a text file for instance) the output from the 42S ? That would be most useful to print program listings on a large printer, or else store the 42S programs on disk, and even to send them to web sites for publication, among other uses.

It should be possible, I think. The question is finding said software. Thanks in advance for any and all answers.

      
Re: HP42S Infrarred Ouput
Message #2 Posted by Steve (Australia) on 21 Sept 2001, 8:49 p.m.,
in response to message #1 by Ex-PPC member

Yeah, I have code to do this.

I'll have a look at what needs to be done to it to make it reasonably easy to operate it and I'll release it an maybe a week.

It requires a suitably configured PC (nothing at all exotic) and you have to make a small hardware device that will cost you less than a new set of batteries for your HP42 :-)

            
Re: HP42S Infrarred Ouput
Message #3 Posted by Ex-PPC member on 22 Sept 2001, 11:41 p.m.,
in response to message #2 by Steve (Australia)

Steve wrote: > It requires a suitably configured PC (nothing at all exotic) and you have to make a small hardware device that will cost you less than a new set of batteries for your HP42 :-)

Thanks for your answer, but why is any hardware necessary, small or large ? My laptop already does have an infrared input/output port, so that would be adequate, wouldn't it ?

                  
Re: HP42S Infrarred Ouput
Message #4 Posted by Andrés C. Rodríguez on 23 Sept 2001, 10:50 a.m.,
in response to message #3 by Ex-PPC member

The infrarred port in your computer is connected to a serial-like interface, standarized as IRDA, which is prepared to accept data in a format different from the HP proprietary format for printing, defined around 1987. That is why the IRDA interfaces present on many current laptops, and also on some PDA or desktop computers cannot receive the HP calculator data stream.

      
Re: HP42S Infrarred Ouput
Message #5 Posted by Matt Kernal (US) on 22 Sept 2001, 11:14 a.m.,
in response to message #1 by Ex-PPC member

It's been a quite few years now, but I used my 17BII to "print" to an old 386SX (see, I told you it was quite a few years ago), using the simple IR detector circuit & DOS "hpread.exe" program found here:

http://www.hpcalc.org/search.php?query=hpread

Matt

      
Re: HP42S Infrarred Ouput
Message #6 Posted by Vieira, Luiz C. (Brazil) on 22 Sept 2001, 12:36 p.m.,
in response to message #1 by Ex-PPC member

There is also another considerable option.

If an HP48 (S/SX/G/GX) is available and can be connected to the PC, INPRT (a program to the 48 family) is available to do what you want to. This way, anything that is sent to the IR printer will be 'printed' into an HP48 file. The resulting string containing the ´printed´ characters will be placed in level 2, as a control '0' or '1' will be at level 1.

INPRT is easy to find at

http://www.hpcalc.org/

It´s necessary to search for it. If you don´t find INPRT, send me an e-mail and I will send you a copy.

Best regards


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