Cognitive Solutions A776, B780 manual Real-time commands, Send printer software version

Chapter 5: Programming commands  89

Flash memory user sector status (n = 4 or n = 52)

Bit	Off/On	Hex	Decimal	Status for transmit status
0	–	–	–	Undefined. Fixed to off.
1	–	–	–	Undefined. Fixed to off.
2	Off	00	0	User data storage write successful
	On	04	4	User data storage write failed, specified area not erased.
3	Off	00	0	Flash logo area adequate, definition stored.
	On	08	8	Flash logo area not adequate for recent definition.
4	Off	00	0	Not used. Fixed to off.
5	Off	00	00	No thermal user-defined characters written to flash.
	On	20	32	Thermal user-defined characters written to flash.
6	Off	00	0	No impact user-defined characters written to flash.
	On	04	64	Impact user-defined characters written to flash.
7	–	–	–	Undefined.
Send printer software version
ASCII		US V
Hexadecimal		1F 56
Decimal		31 86

The printer returns 8 bytes containing the boot and flash software version. The first 4 bytes returned are an ASCII string for the boot version.

The second 4 bytes are an ASCII string for the flash version. Example: For 1.234.56 (8 bytes), the boot version is 1.23 and the flash version is 4.56.

Real-time commands

The real time commands provide an application interface to the printer even when the printer is not handling other commands:

•Real-time status transmission: GS (Hex 1D) sequence and DLE (Hex 10) sequence

•Real-time request to printer: GS (Hex 1D) sequence and DLE (Hex 10) sequence

•Real-time printer status transmission

The batch mode printer status commands are placed in the printer’s data buffer as they are

received and handled by the firmware in the order in which they were received. If the paper exhausts while printing data that was in the buffer ahead of the status command, the printer

goes busy at the RS-232C interface and suspends processing the data in the buffer until paper

is reloaded. This is true for all error conditions: knife home error, thermal printhead overheat, etc. In addition, there is no way to restart the printer after a paper jam or to cancel a slip waiting condition when using the wait for slip command.

The real-time commands are implemented in two ways in order to overcome the limitations of batch mode status commands. Both implementations offer the same functionality; which one you choose depends on the current usage of your application.

A776-PG00001 C 12/09 A776 (B780) Programming Guide