You might think the serial port is dead, but it really just transformed into a USB port. Other commands inside the program - by default, triggered by Control+T - let you do things like send a break, toggle handshaking lines, and more. You can use command line options to set up most items including features like redirecting to a network socket. For example, you can elect to have local echo turned on or map characters so that, for example, a carriage return turns into a carriage return and a line feed. Of course, you want some terminal features and tio includes those. We especially like that it can automatically reconnect which is a great feature. There’s also hex support and many ways to log data and statistics. There’s support for delayed characters and lines, useful if you are dealing with a super simple device with no handshaking. The software will support arbitrary devices, show statistics, and give you control of the RS232 lines.

Honestly, how many times have you needed Zmodem file transfers and recognition of the DCD signal to detect an incoming connection? Sure there are many other programs that will do the job, but tio brings a clean simplicity along with functionality that embedded developers need. We bet that’s why developed tio, a serial device I/O tool for people like us. The bad news is that most of the terminal software is made to accommodate the days when a computer had real serial terminals and modems with people interacting with them. That’s important when you use a lot of serial-like devices like Arduinos with USB ports and the like. The good news is that Linux has great support for serial hardware of all sorts and a host of tools for accessing the serial port. With Linux and the serial port there is good news and there is bad news.

Serial terminal program windows 10