rt-stepper A command-line tool that provides a real-time stepper motor CNC gcode virtual machine when used with the USB-to-parallel dongle
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motor CNC stepper motor USB-to-parallel dongle CNC gcode stepper

rt-stepper Description

A command-line tool that provides a real-time stepper motor CNC gcode virtual machine when used with the USB-to-parallel dongle The rt-stepper program along with it's USB-to-parallel dongle is a real time stepper motor CNC gcode virtual machine. rt-stepper works with existing CNC controllers that only support a parallel port. rt-stepper is a small ncurses terminal program that can run on any OS that supports libusb. Both manual and auto CNC operations are supported.rt-stepper is an open source software, but the dongle is sold as a product.Developer commentsI developed this product after using EMC for several years with my Sherline CNC mills. EMC works great, but requires a PC with a real-time kernel and a parallel port to control the mill.I have two mills and two CNC controllers - Camtronics and Xylotex. In order to drive these controllers your PC must have a parallel port. For space consideration a notebook is my ideal PC for driving my controllers. There are older notebooks with parallel ports, but notebooks with parallel ports are a thing of the past. I want to be able to upgrade to the newer notebooks, but still use my old CNC controllers.Then there is the EMC real-time kernel requirement. Normally this means you have to re-boot to run your gcode program or have a dedicated PC to execute the gcode. I want to develop my gcode program on my favorite OS, then execute the gcode on the same PC.With the rt-stepper solution the parallel port and real-time kernel requirements have been eliminated. rt-stepper has no special runtime requirements, other than ncurses and libusb, so rt-stepper runs on most OSs such as Linux, Mac and Windows.Currently I'm eating my own "dog food" with this product. This means I actually use rt-stepper to build the USB-to-parallel dongle. Both the dongle PCB and case are milled with rt-stepper. You don't get a feel for a product unless you use it.

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