Two Linux machines (embedded board and PC) are connected to each other via USB cable, and communication is established via USB gadget/Ethernet. Both sides have IP address, ping works, etc.
I need to find a way to detect USB cable disconnect on the board side, ideally with a single Bash command.
ifconfig usb0 still shows IP address and that device is "UP" and "RUNNING" even after unplugging the cable.
In my particular case it turned out to be HW+SW issue: driver (atmel_usba_udc) is using USB power (VBUS) to detect connection, since it's acting as a slave and power is provided by host. However in PCB power is provided unconditionally by the board itself for all USB ports at once.
Normally any standard method should work: ifconfig or sysfs.
One way to do this is to check the file:
/sys/class/net/usb0/operstate
If the file content is "up" then the link exists. If the content is "down", then there is no link.
Related
What I want to do:
An AI program on a host machine, reading inputs from a camera sensing the screen of the target machine and outputting controls to the target machine via USB connection--programming the host machine's USB host as a USB peripheral connected to the target machine.
What I want to do step by step: (is it possible to implement the steps below?)
Have a host machine A and a target machine B.
Connect A and B with a USB 3.0 Type-A male-male cable.
The USB connection shows up as an HID keyboard device on B.
Write code to simulate key presses on A that sends to B.
(Eg. calling press('F') on a program running on A would type F to B's input)
It shouldn't require any program installed on B.
What I already searched:
USB 3.0 Host to host connection is possible:
https://superuser.com/questions/795053/how-do-i-connect-two-computers-using-usb-3-0
USB 2.0 Host to host connection is impossible:
https://superuser.com/questions/99274/how-to-connect-two-computers-with-usb
Similar questions asked without the assumption that USB 3.0 Host to Host connection is possible:
https://superuser.com/questions/1128365/simulate-usb-keyboard-from-machine
Setting up a computer to act as an HID device connected to another computer via ps/2,usb or another wired connection
https://superuser.com/questions/507921/computer-to-act-as-keyboard?rq=1
Suggestions in ascending order of feasibility:
USB Gadgets
You are using linux, so the default way would be to create/configure/load a gadget driver. Have a look at this tutorial, though for a raspberry, should work on your PC too. However, I could not find any information regarding the use of USB3 - the tutorial assumes your host is using one of it's OTG ports, which your PC most likely does not have. So whether this works with your USB3.1 Type-A-to-Type-A connection you'll need to test.
USBIP
The idea of sharing USB devices (not just keyboards) is not really new. With USBIP you can "export" any local USB device to the network, and your client will need the client-side USBIP driver to access the keyboard.
Dont bother with USB at all, just use Ethernet
I'd simply write two userland scripts/programs that send/receive+execute the keystrokes. Very easy to implement, you're probably familiar with python anyway.
If you absolutely cant have software installed on the client-PC and your Type-C-to-Type-C connection doesnt support USB Gadgets, there's another way. It basically involves the use of two USB-to-serial adapters (~15$) and a serial cable. While this wont be enumerated as a keyboard, but rather as serial port, it's the lowest-effort solution to transfer data without additional software on the client. Both computers will just do file I/O. If your computers still have COM-ports, you can even omit the serial converters!
A method to Connect / Disconnect a USB device "softly".
Hey, Assume I have a USB device connected to my PC, I want to enable/disable the port it is connected via computer so that I don't have to unplug/plug my device each time.
P.S : Device is a Microcontroller Board ( powered by USB port ) , so I don't want it to be active all the time. I want to deactivate it when appyling changes to code etc. and then activate that port so I can load my code into it again.
Is there a method to do so ?
Thanks in advance.
Device is a Microcontroller Board ( powered by USB port )
Most USB enabled µC types can "unplug" themself.
The idea is to put the USB data pins (usually called D+ and D-) into "output low" state for about one second at startup. This forces USB to be recognized as "disconnected".
After that is done, re-configure the pins to for their USB function and initialze the USB as usual.
Note that this method is not possible on old style boards that still use USB2UART chips instead of hardware USB inside the µC itself.
I'm trying to create a usb based ethernet device on my computer, basically I want to tell my computer (linux based) that one of its usb ports is actually an ethernet port. I have done extensive research and while it's supposed to be possible, I can't find any examples of code / commands to run.
According to wikipedia:
The USB-eth module in Linux makes the computer running it a variation of an Ethernet device that uses USB as the physical medium. It creates a Linux network interface, which can be assigned an IP address and otherwise treated the same as a true Ethernet interface. Any applications that work over real Ethernet interfaces will work over a USB-eth interface without modification, because they can't tell that they aren't using real Ethernet hardware.
So in theory, this should be possible, I just need some help or a gentle nudge in the right direction to get this thing rolling. What I'm NOT trying to do is plug a usb to ethernet dongle/adapter into my computer, I have several of those lying around and that doesn't help me out at all.
this is ethernet-over-usb
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethernet_over_USB
without external hardware you can try the CDCether kernel module and ethtool ( then you can only connect to a usb device that operates in usb device mode )
( https://developer.ridgerun.com/wiki/index.php/How_to_use_USB_device_networking , http://tldp.org/HOWTO/Motorola-Surfboard-Modem/usb.html, http://www.linux-usb.org/usbnet/ )
else you need a physical adapter for this. the adapter translates between the protocols and the different hardware interfaces.
in usb protocol can only be one host in a network, therefore you need at least a host-to-host cable ( http://www.linux-usb.org/usbnet/ ) if you want to connect two usb host devices, i.e. two pcs
required kernel module ( driver ) when using a physical adapter is either usbnet ( with its minidrivers ) or usb-eth
I am on debian and:
I have a USB controller hooked up to a USB port on my PC (Device 1).
I have a male to male USB cord hooked up to another port on the PC that connects to Device 2. (it is a "bridging" usb cord, and has the chip for it)
I want to make them connect to each other as if they were one cord, so neither device knows that there is a computer in the middle.
This would be called a 'Coupler', except that I am using a PC as a coupler.
Here is a (really bad) diagram I made:
What I have done:
I have been able to connect the two devices independently of each other and sniff the results for when they fail to connect. The devices don't send a large volume of data back and forth.
Maybe there is some kind of command tool that I could use, for example (psudocode):
$ couple-usb-ports PORT1 PORT2
You're trying to reinvent the wheel here.
You might consider looking at this link instead.
http://dan3lmi.blogspot.com/2012/10/sniffing-usb-traffic-different.html
Specifically this.
Windows: You cannot directly capture raw USB traffic on Windows with Wireshark/WinPcap, but it is possible to capture and debug USB traffic on a virtual Windows machine under Oracle Virtual Box.
You cannot use a simple PC as transparent USB sniffer without extra (expensive) hardware. An USB bus has always one host (and one or more devices), and the PC can only be the host. This is a hardware limitation.
But you can capture USB data in a Windows machine using Wireshark and USBPcap, eliminating the need for the middle box in most cases.
As this post is tagged Linux, I suppose the controller PC is a Linux machine. Instead of connecting USB ports with a male-male connector, which is all kinds of bad (you are connecting the 5V lines of both machine with each other!), just run Wireshark in the controller PC.
There might be a little work to be done previously, as you have to enable Wireshark for USB monitoring (Particularly in Debian, this is disabled by default), and you might have to install a small driver to enable the monitoring. Have a look at this page for more information.
Once you get it working, Wireshark is an excellent tool for this!
I'm using node-serialport to work with USB devices, however on Windows I can't find out how can I connect to specific device. When I use list function there is only one item with COM3 address, however that is present always, even when no other devices are connected. How can I find out what is the USB device address that can be used for setting up communication?