Dials, Gauges, Knobs and Visual Studio

Projects Interfacing w/ Software on the Computer
1

Hi All,

Forgive me is this has been asked here before, but I was searching the forums, and could not really find anything.

I have a project that I have been working on with a mega, that basically will read a bunch of sensors for Temperature, Voltage, Humidity etc.
I want to then be able to create a simple interface that will work on a PC, that will then graph this data by using Dials, gauges etc (Like for example a Gauge that will display temperature, a meter that will display voltage etc) in real time, while having the Arduino send all this over a serial connection (Possibly over an Xbee or BlueTooth in the future).

I would then also like the ability to be able to place Sliders/Knobs/Switches on this interface, that will then translate to some event on the mega (Like for example pushing a switch, and having a pin go high, that will then turn on a relay etc).

So, is there some sort of a graphical library, that will make this process of developing this GUI an Easy one? Reason why I would prefer something in Visual Studio, is that I would like this to be then a standalone application...so the user runs it, enters a serial port and Baud the Arduino is connected to, and then the data transfer happens, and gets displayed in real time on the GUI and on the gauges/dials etc on that gui.

I have no idea as to how I might be able to create these graphical elements from scratch, and I am sure there HAS to be some libraries/extensions/elements that would make this process easy in Visual Studio. I would then also use something like Firmata to interface the two, but again, I have been struggling to find any sort of tutorials/books etc that show how this is done...

ANY help or guidance here, I would greatly appreciate it from the community here!

Thank you all in advance for your responses!

2

So, is there some sort of a graphical library, that will make this process of developing this GUI an Easy one?

I like C# for this kind of stuff. There are limits to what kinds of UI objects it supports out of the box, but you are free to design your own.

3

Check out MakerPlot for quickly developing a GUI for monitoring and control of your Arduino project.

We wrote it for exactly the needs you discuss... and it's fairly inexpensive :slight_smile:

-Martin

4

selmaware:
Check out MakerPlot for quickly developing a GUI for monitoring and control of your Arduino project.
www.makerplot.com

Looks interesting, however, will I be able to create an executable after the dashboard is designed, so that I may distribute that with an Arduino? I was not able to find this information at your site, to see whether or not that would be possible.

Seems to me if I use this product, the only person able to then use the dashboard is me, since anyone else would also have to purchase the product to use the dashboard...am I correct?

I was looking for more of a development tool that would allow me to do this...

Have been looking at LabView, and Measurement studio for C#....but I was wondering what else is out there to make this process easy....

5

Ah, I see, yes, at this time there is no free "run time" version of MakerPlot. We've kept it as inexpensive as possible while still providing some financial incentive for support and improvements.

Good luck!
Martin