Simulator and ANTUSB2 stick issues

Former Member over 8 years ago

I have some ANTUSB2 sticks that work fine with SimulANT+ and ANTWare II.

I wanted to test some examples that use HRM data in the smulator. When the simulator starts up it displays "ANT USB0 0 connected" which I assume means it can see the ANTUSB2 stick.

When I run the sample code it cannot see the real HRM's I have, the HRM field is static. If I use the menu option "Simulation | FIT Data | Simulate Data" then the HRM field comes to life in the App.

Any suggestions as to what might be going wrong, it seems some people have this working but there is no set up information in the docs so I guess its "just supposed to work"

Thanks for any help,
Nick

jim_m_58 over 8 years ago

Unless you are running code that accesses the HRM by way of ANT, the ANT stick doesn't come into play. If you access the HRM by way of Sensor, it uses .fit data, either simulated or by playing back a file.

Same with other sensors like the Tempe. I have ANT code to access a Tempe that uses the ANT Stick, but in most things I access it as a Sensor, and it uses fit data and not the ANT stick.

Former Member over 8 years ago

Thanks for following up. I was hoping that I could use the simulator and the ANTUSB stick to develop IQapplications that could talk to real ANT+ devices. I'm essentially trying to prove the complete end to end link from our Nordic nrf52 running their HRM ANT+ Sensor example to a ConnectIQ application running in the simulator (and by implication on a real Garmin device like my Edge 520). Is there a way to acheive that, your post seems to imply I can do this using ANT and custom networks but not for the ANT+ profiles. Did I understand that correctly? Apologies if this is an odd question, I'm still in the foothills of the ANT ecosystem.

jim_m_58 over 8 years ago

You can use the ant stick to talk to it, but it means you have to write ant code in CIQ. Using the tempe I mentioned, that is a standard sensor (like a HRM), and with ANT CIQ code, I can talk to the real Tempe on my desk. Or I can use Sensor, and get data out of a .fit.

With the sensor you are testing, can you pair it with a real devices as a HRM? In that case, record a .fit on the device, and then play it back in the sim. (Simulation>Fit Data>Playback File) (there's no way to "pair" a standard sensor in the sim - it's not a full device emulator)

Former Member over 8 years ago

Yes, the sensor example running on the Nordic chip is visible as an HRM on my Edge 520 (it is also visible in the SimulANT+ simulator using the ANTUSB stick).

So, to check my understanding, if I want to talk to an ANT+ device over the ANTUSB stick from ConnectIQ I essentially need to reimplement the ANT+ profile on top of ANT in my application code? The alternative being to record a FIT file and have the simulator feed it into the simulators implementation of the ANT+ profile libraries?

Is there something that makes supporting the ANT+ profiles on the ANTUSB stick from the simulator hard? It seems like something developers would want to do as a stepping stone from a PC emulation to full device deployment.

jim_m_58 over 8 years ago

You need to have ant code in your CIQ code to use the ant stick. I think for most people, they will treat things as a standard sensor and use a .fit file. If you're trying to use a non standard sensor, you'll be writing the ant code anyway, and I think to most devs, they wouldn't want to access a physical standard sensor with ant - the sim provides the ability to replay data in the event of a bug.

Former Member over 8 years ago

It looks like the MO2Display sample does this in its MO2Sensor.mc file. I will have a look at the detail. I'm trying to give the App developers the best environment I can for the sensor.

Thanks for your time.