μ Serial Terminal

A micro serial terminal written in Python.

Usage

Usage: microst -p port [-b baudrate] [-c bytesize] [-s stopbits] [-P parity]

Arguments:
    -h, --help:     Show this help message and exit

    -p, --port:     The serial port to connect to.

    -b, --baudrate: The baudrate to use. (Default: 9600)
        Available baudrates:
            300, 600, 1200, 2400, 4800, 9600, 14400, 19200, 28800, 38400, 57600,
            115200, 128000, 256000

    -c, --bytesize: The bytesize to use. (Default: 8)

    -s, --stopbits: The stopbits to use. (Default: 1)
        Available values: 1, 2

    -P, --parity:   The parity to use. (Default: N)
        Available options:
            E: Even parity
            O: Odd parity
            N: No parity
            M: Mark parity
            S: Space parity

Features

I needed a serial terminal that allowed me to send files and in general more flexibility than a standard terminal.

This terminal therefore has VI style modes, which are:

💬 Insert mode

⚠ It is the default mode.

Insert mode is used to communicate with the serial port, it can be accessed by pressing i from normal mode.

🔀 Normal mode

Normal mode is used to switch between modes.

⚠ It can be accessed by pressing <ctrl> ] rather than <esc>. That way, <esc> can be sent to the serial port.

⚡ Command mode

Command mode is activated by pressing the : key from normal mode. Currently, there are 3 commands:

:q

Quit the terminal.

:send <filename>

Send the file <filename> to the connected device.

exec <filename> [<function name> <arguments>]

Executes the function <function name> (or main if not specified) with Serial object and the arguments <arguments>.

For example, with the following file:

# my_script.py

import serial


def send_file(s: serial.Serial, filename: str):
    with open(filename, "rb") as f:
        s.write(f.read())
    return 1

executing :exec my_script send_file foo.bin will send the file foo.bin to the connected device.

(we could also have used :send foo.bin)

Installation

μst can be installed with pip:

$ pip install microst