OS - macOS: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 18:55, 17 May 2017

Quick Downloads

Already know what you're doing? Here you go:

If you need older versions of the macOS libraries, click here.

Getting Started with macOS

Welcome to using Phidgets with macOS. If you haven't already, check out the user guide for your device. If you are ready to go, the first step in creating macOS applications with Phidgets is installing the Phidget libraries!

Install

To install the core Phidget files onto your system, follow these steps:

1. Download the Phidget installer for your system:

macOS installer download

2. Open up the installer, and double click on Phidgets.pkg to install the libraries.

3. Continue with the installation.

Success! You have finished installing the Phidgets software on your machine. Before you begin coding, let's verify that your Phidget is able to communicate with your machine.

Verify

The best way to verify that your libraries are installed and your Phidget is working is to use the Phidget Control Panel. The Phidget Control Panel is a powerful tool that will help you develop your Phidgets applications. Get started by following the instructions below:

1. Open Finder and navigate to the Phidget Control Panel in the Applications list.

2. Double click on the Phidgets icon to bring up the Phidget Control Panel. You can now see all the Phidgets that are plugged into your machine, as well as any Phidgets that are on the network.

3. Click on the arrow beside a device to expand it so that you can see all available channels. Double click on one of these channels to open up a window that lets you interact with it. macOS Control Panel Channel

The Phidget Control Panel can be used for testing devices, updating firmware, enabling a network server, and more! Visit the Phidget Control Panel page if you want to delve a little deeper.

Your Phidget is now able to communicate with your development machine. The next step is selecting a programming language so you can start to write some code!

If you do not see your device in the Phidget Control Panel, visit the general troubleshooting page.

Programming

Ready to write some code? Select one of the programming languages below:

Great choices for beginners:

Also supported:

Phidget Network Server

The Phidget Network Server is an extremely useful feature of Phidgets that allows you to remotely control Phidgets over your network. If you haven't already, check out the Phidget Network Server page a complete overview.

Try it out!

In order to try the Phidget Network Server out, you will need a host computer, and a client computer:

Host computer: the computer that is physically connected to the Phidgets via USB and is running the Phidget Network Server.
Client computer: a computer running a Phidgets application that accesses Phidgets connected to the host computer.

If you only have one computer, don't worry, your machine can act as both a host and a client.

Next, follow these steps:

1. Open the Phidget Control Panel on the host computer. Do this by double-clicking on the icon in your applications folder. Navigate to the Network Server tab, you will see the following:

From here, you can start or stop the Network Server. You can also decide when the Network Server will start.

2. Check the automatic start box and enter a server name. By enabling automatic startup, the Network Server will run immediately after macOS boots, so you won't have to manually start it again. You can verify the Network Server is running by looking at the label beside the start/stop button.

Now that you have the Network Server running on your host computer, the next step will be accessing the Phidgets connected to your host computer from your client computer. Follow the steps below:

1. Open the Phidget Control Panel on your client computer. You will see something like this:

As you can see from the image above, remote Phidgets are listed under the following heading:

Remote Server: Servername

2. You now have access to the Phidgets that are connected to your host computer. Try double-clicking one of them to bring up an example:

Note the label in the example indicating a remote connection. This means the example is using the Network Server in order to communicate with the Phidget.

What's next?

Now that you have seen the Network Server in action, you may be interested in implementing an application that takes advantage of all it's features. Luckily, every programming language we support comes with example code on how to do this! Jump to programming languages above.

For more information about the Network Server tab on the Phidget Control Panel, visit the Visit the Phidget Control Panel page.

Advanced Information

These files that were placed onto your system as part of the installation process:

Phidget22.framework contains the actual Phidget library, which is used at run-time. It is placed into /Library/Frameworks.
Phidget.kext is the kernel extension. It is placed into /System/Library/Extensions.
phidgetnetworkserver22 is the Phidget Network Server. It is placed into /usr/local/bin.

@@ Line 67: / Line 67: @@
 ==Phidget Network Server==
+The Phidget Network Server is an extremely useful feature of Phidgets that allows you to remotely control Phidgets over your network. If you haven't already, check out the [[Phidget Network Server]] page a complete overview.
-The Phidget Network Server allows you to remotely control Phidgets over a network. For more information, please see the [[Phidget Network Server]]  page.
+===Try it out!===
+In order to try the Phidget Network Server out, you will need a host computer, and a client computer:
+*Host computer: the computer that is physically connected to the Phidgets via USB and is running the Phidget Network Server.
+*Client computer: a computer running a Phidgets application that accesses Phidgets connected to the host computer.
+If you only have one computer, don't worry, your machine can act as both a host and a client.
-Drivers for the Phidget Network Server on macOS are already included in the [[#Quick Downloads | Drivers]] above. If you have the Phidget Control Panel app installed, you already have the Network Server installed.
-There are two ways that you can connect to a Phidget hosted on another computer. The first method is by using the IP address/host name and port of the host computer. The second method makes the use of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multicast_DNS mDNS], which allows Phidgets to be found and opened on the network by a server id instead of an IP address/host name. When using a server id, both the client and server will need to be running an implementation of zero configuration networking. The Phidget Network Server takes advantage of the [https://support.apple.com/kb/DL999?locale=en_US Bonjour] software, which is built-in to macOS. It is a tool developed by Apple to locate devices, such as Phidgets, on a network.
+Next, follow these steps:
-This section helps you install, check, and use the Network Server on macOS, but we also have an overview of the [[Phidget Network Server]] in general.
+. Open the Phidget Control Panel on the host computer. Do this by double-clicking on the [[File:Ph.jpg|link=]] icon in your applications folder. Navigate to the Network Server tab, you will see the following:
-===Using the Network Server===
+[[File:macos_networkserver.png|link=|center]]
-To use a Phidget over the  Network Server, you'll want to:
+From here, you can start or stop the Network Server. You can also decide when the Network Server will start.
-# Have two different computers connected to the same network. We will call the computer that has the Phidget directly connected to the USB port the '''host'''. The '''client''' will be the computer that runs a Phidget application to connect to the Phidget attached to the host. Please note that if you only have a single computer, you can also connect to the Phidget over the Network Server. The computer will simply act as both a host and client. This will allow you to bypass the [[General Phidget Programming # Details for Open() | one application per Phidget limitation]].
-# Start the Network Server on the computer that directly connects to the Phidget
-# Run your program on the remote computer that will control the Phidget over the network
-First ensure that the Phidget drivers have been installed on both the host and client computers. Next, we will set up the Network Server and run the Phidget example program on the client. Please follow these steps:
+[[File:macos_networkserver_run.png|link=|center]]
-. On the host computer, double click on the [[File:Ph.jpg|link=]] icon in the Apps list to bring up the Control Panel. In the {{Code|Network Server}} tab, you can start, restart or stop the Network Server. You can also choose to have the Network Server start up automatically upon boot up by checking the box beside {{Code|Start automatically on boot}}. Otherwise, you will have to manually turn the Network Server on everytime you wish to use it. You'll need administrator privileges in order to make changes to these settings. You can see the status of the Network Server at the top of the window beside the Start/Stop button, where it will say "Network Server is running" or "Network Server is stopped".
+. Check the automatic start box and enter a server name. By enabling automatic startup, the Network Server will run immediately after macOS boots, so you won't have to manually start it again. You can verify the Network Server is running by looking at the label beside the start/stop button.
-[[File:macOS_ControlPanel_NetworkService_Setup_Stopped.jpg|link=|left|425px|alt=macOS Control Panel Network Server Setup]]
+Now that you have the Network Server running on your host computer, the next step will be accessing the Phidgets connected to your host computer from your client computer. Follow the steps below:
-[[File:macOS_ControlPanel_NetworkService_Running.jpg|link=|425px|alt=macOS Control Panel Network Server Setup]]
-. Ensure that the Phidget is plugged in to the host.
+Now that you have the Network Server running on your host computer, the next step will be accessing the Phidgets connected to your host computer from your client computer. Follow the steps below:
-. On the client computer, open up the Phidget Control Panel. On the {{Code|Phidgets}} tab you will see the Phidget that is plugged into the host as one of the entries listed under the heading of {{Code|Remote Server: <Hostname>}}. Double click on one of the Phidget's objects to open the example application.
-[[File:macOS_ControlPanel_NetworkService_List.PNG|link=|alt=macOS Control Panel Network Server]]
+. Open the Phidget Control Panel on your client computer. You will see something like this:
-. The example application will open up, and you will be able to communicate with the Phidget over the Network Server.
-[[File:macOS_network_Example.jpg|link=|alt=macOS Control Panel Example]]
+[[File:macos_controlpanel_remote.png|link=|center]]
-. You can confirm that this Phidget is truly being used of the Network Server by stopping the Network Server while the example application is still open. On the host's Phidget Control Panel, go to the {{Code|Network Server}} tab and hit {{Code|Stop Network Server}} to terminate the Network Server. Now, take a look at the example application on the client. Since the application can no longer find this Phidget over the Network Server, all of the information disappears and the window says that "Nothing" is attached to this channel.
-[[File:macOS_ControlPanel_NetworkService_Disconnected.PNG|link=|alt=macOS Control Panel Network Server Stopped]]
+As you can see from the image above, remote Phidgets are listed under the following heading:
-===Debugging the Network Server===
+*Remote Server: Servername
-In addition to enabling [[General Phidget Programming#Logging|logging]] in your Phidget code, you can get additional debugging information from the Network Server itself.  This additional debugging can be found in the log file.
-You can find the Network Server log file at {{Code|/Library/Logs/}}. The easiest way to view this file is to run the Console, which you can launch by searching for it in spotlight. Click the magnifying glass in the top right corner of the screen or hit Command+Space and search for Console.
+. You now have access to the Phidgets that are connected to your host computer. Try double-clicking one of them to bring up an example:
-[[File:macOS_Console_log.PNG|link=|900px|alt=MacOS Console]]
-Under {{Code|/Library/Logs/}}, you can find {{Code|phidgetNetworkService22.log}}. Errors related to the Control Panel can instead be found in {{Code|phidgetcontrolpanel22.log}} in {{Code|~/Library/Logs/}}.
+[[File:macos_controlpanel_remoteexample.png|link=|center]]
-Each message in the log file will list the type of the message, the time and date, the place in the libraries the message came from, and a description. This can be very useful for figuring out why certain parts of one of the examples or the Network Server are not working properly.
+Note the label in the example indicating a remote connection. This means the example is using the Network Server in order to communicate with the Phidget.
+===What's next?===
+Now that you have seen the Network Server in action, you may be interested in implementing an application that takes advantage of all it's features. Luckily, every programming language we support comes with example code on how to do this! Jump to [[#Programming|programming languages]] above.
+For more information about the Network Server tab on the Phidget Control Panel, visit the Visit the [[Phidget Control Panel#Windows|Phidget Control Panel]] page.
 ==Advanced Information==

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