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Serial HOWTO

David S.Lawyer original by Greg Hankins

v2.15 November 2001


This document describes serial port features other than those which should be covered by Modem-HOWTO, PPP-HOWTO, Serial-Programming-HOWTO, or Text-Terminal-HOWTO. It does not cover the Universal Serial Bus (see the kernel documentation for USB). It lists info on multiport serial cards. It contains technical info about the serial port itself in more detail than found in the above HOWTOs and should be best for troubleshooting when the problem is the serial port itself. If you are dealing with a Modem, PPP (used for Internet access on a phone line), or a Text-Terminal, those HOWTOs should be consulted first.

1. Introduction

2. How the Hardware Transfers Bytes

3. Serial Port Basics

4. Is the Serial Port Obsolete?

5. Multiport Serial Boards/Cards/Adapters

6. Configuring Overview

7. Locating the Serial Port: IO address, IRQs

8. Configuring the Serial Driver (high-level) "stty"

9. Serial Port Devices /dev/ttyS2, etc.

10. Interesting Programs You Should Know About

11. Speed (Flow Rate)

12. Locking Out Others

13. Communications Programs And Utilities

14. Serial Tips And Miscellany

15. Troubleshooting

16. Interrupt Problem Details

17. What Are UARTs? How Do They Affect Performance?

18. Pinout and Signals

19. Voltage Waveshapes

20. Other Serial Devices (not async EIA-232)

21. Other Sources of Information

22. Appendix: Obsolete Hardware (prior to 1990) Info


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