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3D Printer Interface

3D Printer Interface using Node.js!

ChangeLog

Status: Core functionality is now in place. Started to prepare technical documentation for UI integration. UI interface still under development (at the moment there are only some basic test functionalities)

• Update 4 (19-Jan-2013)

  • Added documentation for the REST API interface (required for UI implementation)
  • Refactored core module configurations to use config/*.json files
  • Fixed issues #12, #13, #14
  • .

• Update3 (31-Dec-2012)

  • Added Socket.io for websockets communication (currently used to upload printer response to UI, should add support for bidirectional communication - will also maintain REST for API interface)
  • Added support in printer.js UI Library to map local callbacks with Socket.io Event Messages for easy integration with UI components
  • Fixed issues #2, #3, #4, #5, #6, #7, #8, #11
  • .

• Update2 (29-Nov-2012):

  • Ported and re-factored R2C2 webinterface (including client javascript helper file)
  • Added app.js code to deploy initial WebInterface for UI testing
  • Added rest.js module code to deploy REST API
  • Created mainapp.js to bind upper rest.js module requests with lower level modules (core.js serial communications module, slicer.js, downloader.js, etc)
  • .

• Update1 (06-Nov-2012): Initial ./modules/core.js module is now working with writable stream interface, serialport communication support completed and also internal minimal cache/stream data parser engine in place.

TODO

- Completlety redesign the frontend UI and add extra functionalities
- Create documentation to explain core modules communication/workflow

Techincal Specs initial draft (work in progress)

https://www.lucidchart.com/documents/view/4f5c-1f6c-50baa492-9d74-10150a442276

REST API documentation (required for UI integration)

https://github.com/nneves/3DPrinterInterface/blob/master/documentation/rest.md

How to test 3DPI

It is now possible to test the WebInterface and send a simple GCODE command to printer. There is also an initial support to print data from .gcode files located at /bin/gcode/ .

// clone repo

$ git clone git://github.com/nneves/3DPrinterInterface.git
$ cd 3DPrinterInterface

// update node required packages

$ npm update

// update configuration files (./config/*.json)

More info here: npm config package

# update rpi.json file and update the serialport property
nano ./config/rpi.json

// set node.js environment var to use ./config/rpi.json

// Note: when using default.json it is not required to export the variable, several config files can be set, only the exported will be used by node.js

export NODE_ENV=rpi

// launch demo WebInterface (will run on port 8080, REST API on 8081 and using the serialport defined in the exported config file)

$ node app.js

// Note: to test node app.js without a printer configure the serialport property with /dev/null to emulate printer serial port - printer response emulated by timer (default.js already configured with /dev/null)

3d Printers/electronic boards/microcontrollers tested hardware

• Currently using an Ultimaker 3d printer

• Also testing with R2C2 electronic board from this project: https://github.com/nneves/R2C2_WebInterface

• Using MBED microcontroller (could also use an Arduino) for a 3d printer emulator (without any logic, just receives USB serialport data and responds back with an 'ok' when it finds and ENTER - no gcode validation nor other logic): http://mbed.org/users/botdream/code/3dprinter_usbserialport_emulator/

• Also using /dev/null interface for dummy tests.

License

Copyright (C) 2012 Nelson Neves

This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU Affero General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU Affero General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU Affero General Public License along with this program. If not, see http://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl-3.0.html