Running two arduinos at the same time on different com ports...

Projects General Guidance
1

I have two arudino sketches running at the same time and each individual arduino sketch/board controls a processing sketch. However, every time I switch the serial com ports of one arduino IDE it switches the other one to the same one. I would like each individual arduino sketch running off of a different com port and have both running at the same time. Please reference https://vimeo.com/134682236 for the video I made showing this.

Both sketches run excellently individually, however, not at the same time. I have labeled each arduino different in the com ports in the device manager however, it's in the IDE of arduino that is giving me issues. Feel free to help if you can and thank you all for your time.

2

I also have pictures of the set up..just ask if you want to see them and please reference the video:

https://vimeo.com/134682236

to understand what I am talking about.

Thank you all,

Matt

3

Yes the IDE can only cope with one serial connection at a time. You can use another terminal program for the other one. Something like putty or serialZilla or god forbid hyper terminal.

4

Launch a second instance of the IDE. Just opening a second file from one IDE will not work. You have to launch a new IDE. At least in Windows 8.1 this works. I click the Arduino IDE shortcut on my start menu for each arduino board I have attached to my pc.
Each has a working serial monitor and each retains individual comm port settings.

5

Frostline:
Launch a second instance of the IDE. Just opening a second file from one IDE will not work. You have to launch a new IDE. At least in Windows 8.1 this works. I click the Arduino IDE shortcut on my start menu for each arduino board I have attached to my pc.
Each has a working serial monitor and each retains individual comm port settings.

I can confirm that works.

6

I will give that a shot and let you know what happens...I think I know what you are talking about but I will keep you posted.

7

Thank you Frostline and Henry_Best! My project works now!

8

If you want to do run multiple Arduino boards at the same time on a APPLE MAC I found this thread helpful: serial - Is it possible to connect many arduino uno in one pc? - Arduino Stack Exchange.

and specifically this simple command that you can enter into a terminal to open up multiple instances of the Arduino IDE:

$ open -n /Applications/Arduino.app/

And then select the second Arduino attached to each com port within each IDE instance. Tools/Ports/Serial Ports...

(thanks to Ido Ran User Ido Ran - Arduino Stack Exchange)