WebApp Hardware Bridge

Introduction

WebApp Hardware Bridge made it possible for WebApps to perform silent print and access to serial ports.

Common use cases:

• Web-based POS - PDF and ESC/POS receipt silent print
• Web-based WMS - Serial weight scale real-time reading, delivery note/packing List silent print
• Any WebApps need to read/write to serial ports

Features

• Direct print from WebApps
• Serial port read/write from WebApps
• Support all modern browsers that implemented WebSocket (Chrome, Firefox, Edge... etc)
• HTTP API to configure directly from your WebApp
• JS SDK/Example included

Direct Print

• 0-click silent printing in web browsers
• Download via URL / Base64 encoded file / Base64 encoded binary raw command
• Support multiple printers, mapped by key
• Support PDF/PNG/JPG Printing
• Support RAW/ESC-POS Printing
• Support adding annotation text to PDF/Image before printing
• Per printer settings

Serial Access

• Bidirectional communication
• Support multiple ports, mapped by key
• Support multiple connection share same serial port
• Serial weigh scale (AWH-SA30 supported out-of-box in JS SDK)
• Per port settings (Baud rate, data bits, stop bit, parity bit)

How to use?

Client Side

1. Install and setup mapping via Web UI / API

2. Start "WebApp Hardware Bridge" and start using your WebApp

WebApp Side

1. Check JS SDK/Example

How it works?

WebApp Hardware Bridge is a Java based application, which have more access to underlying hardwares.

It exposes a WebSocket server on localhost to accept print jobs and serial connections from browsers.

Print Jobs

• PDF/Images job are downloaded/decoded and then sent to mapped printer.
• Raw job are sent to mapped printer directly.

Serial Connections

• Serial port are opened by Java and "proxied" as WebSocket stream
• Serial port can be shared by multiple connections
• Bidirectional communications possible

Mappings

Web UI / API are provided to set up mappings between keys and printers/serials.

Therefore, WebApps do not need to care about the actual printer names.

More documents

• Configurations
• HTTP APIs
• Advanced Configurations - Authentication
• Advanced Configurations - HTTPS/WSS Support
• Build from source
• Troubleshooting

Upgrade

• Settings will lost after upgrade from 0.x to 1.0, please reconfigure via "Web UI" or "Web API"

Changelogs

• Changelogs