TetherCom Library

Author

ValoFly GmbH suppo.nosp@m.rt@v.nosp@m.alofl.nosp@m.y.co.nosp@m.m

What is TetherCom?

This cross-plattform library is designed to communicate with ValoFly Tether.Solutions ground stations. This library is written in modern C++ and uses C++ 11 standards.

TetherCom class provides common functions to interface with hardware devices like open, close connection, set and get parameters, configurations and system details of ValoFly Tether.Solutions ground stations. For simple integration to other C++ projects, TetherCom library is designed as CMake package.

To use TetherCom library, serial communication library by William Woodall and John Harrison (Serial) is required. Serial communication library is already part of the pre-built packages of TetherCom library but has to be included as CMake find package in projects using TetherCom library.

TetherCom library package contains examples how to work with this library.

Getting Started

To interface ValoFly Tether.Solutions ground stations check out main class documentation: VALOFLY::TetherCom

Features

Features of VALOFLY::TetherCom

• system details of ValoFly Tether.Solutions ground stations
• activity control and status of ValoFly Tether.Solutions ground stations
• get information of unwounded tether cable
• configuration and status of tether cable retraction
• system and UAV power, voltage and current consumption
• different flight and system usage times

Resources

• Website: https://valofly.com
• Interface documentation: https://docs.valofly.com/TetherComLib/latest/
• Pre-built packages (contains pre-built dependecies):
  • win-64: Windows 64-bit VC16 build
  • linux-64: Unix 64-bit gcc 8.3.0 build
  • linux-aarch64: Unix aarch64 64-bit gcc 8.3.0 build
  • linux-armv7: GNU/Linux armv71 32-bit gcc 8.3.0 build
  • linux-armv6: GNU/Linux armv61 32-bit gcc 8.3.0 build
  • linux-armv5: GNU/Linux armv5 32-bit gcc 8.3.0 build

Dependencies

• CMake:
  • CMake is required for building the system, it is available here: https://cmake.org
• serial
  • serial is required for compiling projects using TetherCom, it is part of pre-built packages. For further information to serial visit project website: https://github.com/wjwwood/serial

Package usage

TetherCom library is designed to be used with CMake projects. Besides of TetherCom library, serial library has to be available for the project since TetherCom library link to it.

Place the library package consists of TetherCom library and serial library in a folder, where CMake and compiler can access them. Set TETHERCOM_ROOT_DIR of CMakeLists.txt of your project to /path/to/library_package/TetherComLib, extend CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH with TETHERCOM_ROOT_DIR and use find_package for TetherCom.

If relations of both folder of TetherComLib and serial are still same as they delivered as package, TetherCom library will find path to serial library. If this will fail, path to serial library has to be configured by set SERIAL_ROOT_DIR to /path/to/serial and extend CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH with SERIAL_ROOT_DIR.

For example, supposed that library package is placed in 3rdParty in project folder:

### TetherCom ###
set(TETHERCOM_ROOT_DIR "${PROJECT_SOURCE_DIR}/3rdParty/TetherComLib")
set(CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH ${CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH} ${TETHERCOM_ROOT_DIR})
find_package(TetherCom REQUIRED)

This example supposed, TetherCom library is able to determine location of serial lib.

In case of TetherComLib is not able to determine location of serial lib add its path to project configuration:

### serial ###
set(SERIAL_ROOT_DIR "/path/to/serial")
set(CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH ${CMAKE_PREFIX_PATH} ${SERIAL_ROOT_DIR})

Finaly CMake link targets have to be set with:

target_link_libraries(${TARGET_NAME} VALOFLY::TetherCom::TetherCom)

for TetherCom library.

It is not necessary to link serial library, but its path have to been known to CMake.

Library usage

TetherCom

To use ValoFly Tether.Solutions TetherCom library its header file has to be included to the developed software project, a new instance of VALOFLY::TetherCom object has to be initialized and a connection to ValoFly Tether:Solution ground station has to be opened with VALOFLY::TetherCom::openConnection().

#include <TetherCom/TetherCom.h>
 
int main(int argc, char* argv[])
{    
    // new instance of TetherCom object which handle the connection to the tether ground station
    VALOFLY::TetherCom tetherCom;
    
    std::string portName = "/dev/ttyS0"; // or "COM5"
    
    // try to establish serial connection to tether ground station
    try
    {
        tetherCom.openConnection(portName);
    }
    catch (std::exception ex)
    {
        printf("%s", ex.what());
        return EXIT_FAILURE;
    }
    std::cout << "Open serial port \"" << portName << "\" successfull!" << std::endl;

For more details check example project included in TetherCom library package.

TetherComDefinitions

Many status values of ValoFly Tether.Solution Ground Station are decoded as integer values. VALOFLY::TetherComDefinitions header defines enum values for a better interpretation of received status values. For a quick usage reference Public communication definitions section of TetherCom.h can be enquire. At this part of the header file system status structs are initialized.

License

ValoFly TetherCom

ValoFly TetherCom library is under copyright (C) of ValoFly GmbH - All rights reserved

Unauthorized copying of any file of this software package, constists of source files, binary files, documentation, examples with its documentation and others, via any medium is prohibited. It is allowed to use the libraries to create own software components by the user of the libraries. All resulting components using one or more libraries of these library package are strictly limited to used by the user/customer, who create the resulting software component.

It is strictly prohibited to sell, distribute or publish any product based on or constists of parts of one of the libraries of these library package in any way or via any medium without previous written permission.

Serial Communication Library

Serial Communication Library is licensed under MIT License as it is described in the project source: https://github.com/wjwwood/serial#license

JSON Library

JSON Library is licensed under MIT License as it is described in the project source: https://github.com/nlohmann/json#license