where is the DZX USB Workbench?

This tool was incredibly helpful...do you still support it?

-Bill

Hello Bill,

We haven't added any new features to the original USBPort component or the USB Workbench in a long while. The latest versions are not currently available for download from this site, but I can get that added if it would help? While we don't plan on adding any new features, we would support fixing any bugs/issues.

All of our current and future development is on our software platform (SDK). It includes a more complete USB stack that can support multiple classes.  For generic USB communications in the SDK,  we've switched to using the WinUSB driver over the HID driver on Windows, and followed the USB DFU specification for the bootloaders. Using the WinUSB driver provided more control over the USB bus and gave much greater bandwidth.

We have received several requests to add the features provided by the original USB Workbench, specifically the message definitions and auto code generation, to our more recent USB Terminal tool. See ticket http://dzxdesigns.com/support/tickets/view.aspx?id=7c479d32-460e-4e63-8dfc-ce7a709a4012.

I welcome any feedback, as we're debating the value of adding these features into our latest software. We're also considering whether to include generic communications using the HID driver on Windows, which could provide a simpler driver installation for older Windows at the expense of lesser bandwidth.

-Tyler

I liked Workbench as it created all the output files for me.  Merging was a bit of a chore, but apart from that it worked great.  If this tool is no longer supported, how would I create the C code to handle the messages and the C# code to send the messages?  This sounds now as we have to actually create all the message handlers rather than do this through Workbench which stubbed out the functions.  Not being a WinUSB expert I am curious as to how this all works now with your new SDK?

Bill,

The USB device stack included in the SDK provides a method for sending and receiving generic messages. The messages are just a simple variable length array of bytes. We still have a .NET library that wraps everything up to send and receive these generic messages, so no need to be a WinUSB expert. But you are correct, there is nothing to parse these messages up into anything meaningful (beyond a byte) as the Workbench generated code did.

With growing interest in this parsing functionality, we've decided to go ahead and implement the auto code generation for parsing in a future update of our SDK. We still need to work through our timeline, but I'd expect to have something to test in a few weeks.

-Tyler

Bill,