Visual Basic + Arduino interface

Hey guys!
We are a group of students preparing our final project in order to graduate from college.
We are asking ourselves some questions before starting with the builiding proccess in Visual Basic.
Our main issue is related with the Arduino inputs, cause we don´t really know how to send them to Visual Basic application form. We are using Visual Basic 6.0 and the Arduino board is "Arduino UNO"; and it´s done using USB ports.
We´ve already achieved to link the Arduino with Visual Basic, and we know how to link the outputs in Arduino with the inputs in Visual Basic.
Anticipated thanks!
:wink:

We´ve already achieved to link the Arduino with Visual Basic

Excellent start.

and we know how to link the outputs in Arduino with the inputs in Visual Basic.

Does this mean that you can send data to the Arduino, and make it do things? If so, post the VB code and Arduino code, so we can review it.

Our main issue is related with the Arduino inputs, cause we don´t really know how to send them to Visual Basic application form.

Does this mean that you want the Arduino to send data to the VB application? What data is the Arduino sending? Or, is the problem that it is not sending anything?

QUOTE
We´ve already achieved to link the Arduino with Visual Basic

We kind of expend most time of our last year´s semester on studying the Arduino´s platform, and that meant we had to write a lot of programs. One of the things they taught as was linking Arduino to Visual Basic.

QUOTE
Does this mean that you can send data to the Arduino, and make it do things? If so, post the VB code and Arduino code, so we can review it.

Basically yeah. Our last year global project was to write a program in VB and with Arduino connected to a PC via USB, make it start an electric three-phase engine in one way and reverting the rotation (first stopping the engine, then reverting). I gotta find the code though, I know I have it somewhere else :wink: because I need it in order to write the new code applied to this new project we have in mind. I´ll post it here as soon as I find it!

QUOTE
Does this mean that you want the Arduino to send data to the VB application? What data is the Arduino sending? Or, is the problem that it is not sending anything?

Ok, this is the complicated part of the new project. What we are attempting is kind of ambitious from our point of view.
We are building a scale model of a sports center with soccer and volleyball fields. On those fields, there are gonna be some sensors which mission is to tell us if the ball is inside the field, or outside and depending on that answer, send a signal to some multicolor led diodes showing a color depending on the action of the player. This is only one of the things we want to do. Therefore, those sensors need to communicate with the VB app, so we can build a software according to our needs displaying that info in some kind of technical mode only for technicians.
Hope this is better to understand for you guys! Thanks :slight_smile:

If you can send data TO the Arduino, then you must know how to open a serial port, set the baud rate, etc., and send data to the serial port.

If the Arduino can actually do something with the data, that means you have a protocol - and agreed upon way of presenting information.

Extending the protocol is trivial. It's just a matter of adding some more to the specification document (which might not actually be a paper or electronic document. It might exist only in your brain).

Getting the VB application to read the serial data is a simple matter, too. Put the cursor on the function that writes to the serial port, and press F1. The documentation will have examples of reading data, too.

It isn't clear what kind of help you need/are asking for.