STermPro

Remember those old fax modems, who communicated with the computer via the serial cable? Those modems sent certain signals to the serial port, which were very useful at determining if the communication was all right or not. Nowadays, modems are used by only a few people, but still, the serial port is still useful in some situations. For example, some embedded programmers use development boards that communicate with the computer via the serial port. These devices can also communicate using a USB cable, by creating a virtual serial port connection. Reading the signals that come from these devices or sending certain commands to them can only be done by using a specialized piece of software, also called a terminal.

Older versions of Windows had such a program, but it lacked a lot of features and was very difficult to use. The newest version of Windows doesn't have such a program, so the only thing left to do is to turn to 3rd party terminal applications. One of them is STermPro. This is a Windows terminal software that has all an embedded program could need.

Installing the program is not a difficult task but things change when it comes to using it. Beginners may have serious trouble using the software, as it was specially designed by advanced computer users who frequently use serial devices. This type of users will certainly appreciate what STermPro has to offer.

Connecting to a COM port can be done using a single mouse click. Optionally, some settings regarding the connection can be specified, like the baud rate, the parity and stop bits values. After making all these changes and connecting to the COM port, one will see in real time all the values sent by the serial device and can also send various commands to them, using ASCII, HEX or the PROTO mode. For example, one can send a command to a modem, for making it disconnect from the phone line.

STermPro is compatible with virtually any type of COM port, even virtual ones and allows connecting to an unlimited number of devices at the same time. Navigating through these devices can be easily done because the interface uses tabs. A command can be set to repeat itself after a certain amount of time.