ZBasic Forum

I am looking for a way to eliminate a printer from an instrument I manufacture. The printer is currently a small matrix type device that one might use for printing a receipt at a point-of-sale location. The output is no more than 20 columns and it might be possible to constrain it to 16 columns. The data is numbers and letters only with no special characters. The output is in english. I realize that one might simply print to a small LCD type character display of two or four lines. However, the output most likely consists of 20 or or more lines. If I add a bit of intelligence to the 'printer' along with a fram memory, the instrument could 'print' to the fram and then displayed on the screen with some scrolling. The user could scroll backwards and forwards through the data. I think a minimum of 4 display lines would be optimum. It would be necessary for the display to be portable from the instrument so that the user could slip it into his pocket in order to be able to refer to the data several times without being 'tied' to the instrument location. Smaller is better here.

Is such an idea feasible. I am looking for suggestions for displays and the best way to implement such a system.

Any enlightenment will be appreciated.

Vic

victorf wrote:I am looking for a way to eliminate a printer from an instrument I manufacture. The printer is currently a small matrix type device that one might use for printing a receipt at a point-of-sale location. The output is no more than 20 columns and it might be possible to constrain it to 16 columns. The data is numbers and letters only with no special characters. The output is in english. I realize that one might simply print to a small LCD type character display of two or four lines. However, the output most likely consists of 20 or or more lines. If I add a bit of intelligence to the 'printer' along with a fram memory, the instrument could 'print' to the fram and then displayed on the screen with some scrolling. The user could scroll backwards and forwards through the data. I think a minimum of 4 display lines would be optimum. It would be necessary for the display to be portable from the instrument so that the user could slip it into his pocket in order to be able to refer to the data several times without being 'tied' to the instrument location. Smaller is better here.

Is such an idea feasible. I am looking for suggestions for displays and the best way to implement such a system.

Any enlightenment will be appreciated.

Vic

Sure it is possible. BUT you didn't say if the connection is serial or parallel. Serial sure would be easier.

One way or another, after connecting the external device to your "data logger", establish communitation between the 2. Send the data to the intelligent LCD display.

20 characters wide, by 20 lines is ony 400 bytes of ascii data. So you can stor it to the on-board EEPROM.

Once the download is complete, then disconnect and you are away.

You can run a non-backlit LCD with just a few mA of current, but most need 5v. You would need a few lithium coin cells to power the device, but it could work well.

-Tony

CrystalFontz make a bunch of serial LCD displays, some with built in up/down left/right keypads that might work for your application. You would have to create some communication scheme between the LCD and your ZBasic device, as well as come up with some sort of enclosure and battery arrangement for the LCD. The upside is that the LCD already has built in memory, a microcontroller on board, the keypad, a back light, and all of the associated bit's and pieces to make it work.

-Don