ASCII include file (ASCII.h)

Projects Programming
1

Is there an ASCII include file (ASCII.h or something similar) in the set of Arduino files?

Thanks,

Jack

2

You have to say what you are doing, where you think this might be necessary, but here is an example of using an ascii value to address a font table for a display:

uint32_t getFontbyAscii(char inChar) {
  // use ascii code value to address the font table.
  // assumes font table layout 10 digits followed by 26 letters.
  // change this if you add/delete entries in the font[] table.
  if (inChar >= '0' && inChar <= '9') return font[inChar - '0'];
  if (inChar >= 'A' && inChar <= 'Z') return font[10 + inChar - 'A'];
  if (inChar >= 'a' && inChar <= 'z') return font[10 + inChar - 'a'];
  // we're still here so unsupported ascii code
  return 0;  // blank
}
3

What do you need such a file for ?

4

You do not mean ANSI.h

(escape sequences to control an ANSI terminal e.g. VT100)

5

Besides all the other questions, what would an ASCII include file look like? Examples?

6

I know this file exists SSD1306Ascii.h, probably there are more displays with ascii files.

There are three libs with ASCII in its name, floatToASCII, AsciiMassage, zaber-ascii-for-arduino ?

Finally my RS485 lib has defines for ASCII control characters.

#pragma once
//
//    FILE: ASCII_CONTROL.h
//  AUTHOR: Rob Tillaart
//    DATE: 2020-08-26
// PURPOSE: ASCII control characters
//     URL: https://github.com/RobTillaart/RS485


#define ASCII_NUL     0x00    //  NULL char
#define ASCII_SOH     0x01    //  Start Of Header
#define ASCII_STX     0x02    //  Start of Text
#define ASCII_ETX     0x03    //  End of Text
#define ASCII_EOT     0x04    //  End of Transmission
#define ASCII_ENQ     0x05    //  ENQuiry
#define ASCII_ACK     0x06    //  ACKnowledge
#define ASCII_BEL     0x07    //  Bell
#define ASCII_BS      0x08    //  Back Space
#define ASCII_TAB     0x09    //  TAB char
#define ASCII_LF      0x0A    //  Line Feed
#define ASCII_VT      0x0B    //  Vertical TAB
#define ASCII_FF      0x0C    //  Form Feed
#define ASCII_CR      0x0D    //  Carriage Return
#define ASCII_SO      0x0E    //  Shift Out
#define ASCII_SI      0x0F    //  Shift In
#define ASCII_DLE     0x10    //  Data Link Escape
#define ASCII_DC1     0x11    //  Device Control 1
#define ASCII_DC2     0x12    //  Device Control 2
#define ASCII_DC3     0x13    //  Device Control 3
#define ASCII_DC4     0x14    //  Device Control 4
#define ASCII_NAK     0x15    //  NOT ACKnowledge
#define ASCII_SYN     0x16    //  Synchronous idle
#define ASCII_ETB     0x17    //  End of transmission block
#define ASCII_CAN     0x18    //  CANcel
#define ASCII_EM      0x19    //  End of Medium
#define ASCII_SUB     0x1A    //  Substitute
#define ASCII_ESC     0x1B    //  Escape
#define ASCII_FS      0x1C    //  File Separator
#define ASCII_GS      0x1D    //  Group Separator
#define ASCII_RS      0x1E    //  Record Separator
#define ASCII_US      0x1F    //  Unit Separator
#define ASCII_DEL     0x7F    //  DELete


//  -- END OF FILE --
7

C pretty much assumes everything is ASCII.
ctype.h includes functions you might be looking for:

int     isalnum (int __c)                                                                       
int     isalpha (int __c)                                                                       
int     isascii (int __c)                                                                       
int     isblank (int __c)                                                                       
int     iscntrl (int __c)                                                                       
int     isdigit (int __c)                                                                       
int     isgraph (int __c)                                                                       
int     islower (int __c)                                                                       
int     isprint (int __c)                                                                       
int     ispunct (int __c)                                                                       
int     isspace (int __c)                                                                       
int     isupper (int __c)                                                                       
int     isxdigit (int __c)                                                                      
                                                                                                
int     toascii (int __c)                                                                       
int     tolower (int __c)                                                                       
int     toupper (int __c)
8

Sorry I didn’t reply to this sooner.

robtillaart answered the question as to what one might look like in the file ASCII_CONTROL.h that he posted – Thanks.

As to why, suppose in my code I was looking for an Escape character for some reason. It’s much easier to write if(ch == ASCII_ESC) than have to think for a second, okay what’s the ASCII hex code for an ESC character, look it up in a table, find that it’s 0x1b and then write if(cr == 0x1b).

It’s also more supportable for the next guy that has to look at the code (what the heck is a 0x1b???) to fix a bug (not that my code EVER has bugs), or make a modification.

Thanks,

Jack

9

Thank you for the answer in your reply. But, if people would add a comment on that line of code, all would be so much easier.

10

Yes, I agree. I remember many years ago when I first started coding in C++, it was touted as a “self-commenting” language. That might be true if you were the only person to ever touch the code and if you had a good memory for why you did something years ago, but reasonable comments are essential to good maintainable code.