I built swiss_micros_tools because I was tired of keeping a serial terminal open just to poke a SwissMicros calculator. The USB console is a perfectly good protocol; it should not need a human sitting in the middle. The three chores that matter to me are setting the clock and moving memory both ways.
| Tool | Status | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| dm_set_time | available | I set the calculator clock second-precise from the host. |
| dm_receive | available | I will pull a memory dump without copy-and-paste. |
| dm_send | planned | I will push a memory dump without a terminal session. |
Everything is Ada 2022 with AdaCL. I run the same binaries on macOS, Linux, and Windows. The generated reference lives at GNATdoc.
Install the same way as the sibling HP-41CX suite (just replace hp41cx-tools with swiss-micros-tools:
Then I do this:
dm-get-serial-device.sh / dm-get-serial-port.sh do
this for a DM16L / CP2102N.-d / --device, or export DM_SERIAL_DEVICE.-? / --help when I am stuck. -d Device --device=Device device file (unix) or name (windows)
of the USB serial device.
DM_SERIAL_DEVICE= set via environment variable
-? --help this help
export DM_SERIAL_DEVICE="$(dm-get-serial-device.sh)"
dm_set_time-main
# or, with an explicit stamp and UTC:
dm_set_time-main -d /dev/tty.usbserial-0001 --utc "20260917 150000"
The compact stamp dm_set_time sends is eight digits, a space, six digits (YYYYMMDD HHMMSS). That is not the line
t prints back (2026-09-22 18:09:26 TUE). Omit the stamp and the application will use the host clock.
This page is the workshop door. The two essays behind it are the bench.
I start with the shared library because every later tool hangs off the same UART dialect and the same GetOpt spine.
Then I walk you though the one programme that already ships: how I accept an optional time stamp, how Spitbol checks the correct format, and
the four lines I send once the port is open (ct 1, ts, t, and a blank wake-up).
| Note | Why I wrote it |
|---|---|
| The swiss_micros packages | I keep calculator literals in Console_IO and flags in a hierarchical GetOpt type. Read this before you copy a constant. |
| The dm_set_time packages | I extend that type, check YYYYMMDD HHMMSS, and run the ct / ts / t dialogue. This is the working specimen. |
I built swiss_micros_tools because I was tired of keeping a serial terminal open just to poke a SwissMicros
calculator. 1.8.12 is the release where that stops being a plan for the receive path. The clock was already done. The
dump now is too.
This note is the bench for that release. The short announcement is the door. Here I write down how I actually open the
port, why macOS needed its own body, and which lines dm_receive keeps.