The built-in IO application gives you simple control over all 28 I/O pins. Individually set each pin as an output high, output low, input, or input with built-in pullup resistor. Just click on the radio buttons! Red and green indicators show you whether each pin is high or low. This is a really simple way to control laboratory instruments, or to test more complicated circuits, one I/O pin at a time.

The built-in STEPPER application is a controller for a stepper motor. You will have to provide an external stepper motor driver (both phase/enable and step/direction drivers are supported), but we take care of the rest. Linear acceleration and deceleration, support for microstepping drivers, conversion factors for linear actuators, and PWM current control are just some of the features in this application.

The built-in PULSES application can generate periodic square waves with varying frequency and duty cycle, as well as single-shot pulses. Use this application to experiment with servo motors, vary the speed of DC motors, vary the brightness of LED’s, generate audio tones, and generate pulse-width modulation (PWM) waveforms for a wide variety of applications. The applicaton includes three independent pulse generators.

The built-in SERIAL application allows your GATOR Plus+ board to function as a USB-to-serial converter. No need to buy a separate dedicated converter -- our application easily interfaces to logic-level serial ports found on cellular modules, GPS modules, ZigBee modules, etc. See our 3.3V Interfacing page for easy ways to interface to these types of modules. You can use our built-in TERMINAL application to talk to your module, or use any serial communication program or custom program. The GATOR Plus+ simply appears as another serial port in your system.

The built-in ANALOG application functions as an 8-channel 10-bit analog-to-digital (A/D) converter. Read the analog sample display in real time, or use it as a datalogger to measure and record analog values to a CSV file. The sampling time interval is configurable from as fast as 10 samples per second to one sample every 100 minutes. Reference voltages of 1.1V, 2.56V, and 5V are available. You can even configure each channel to display samples in the physical units of the process being measured (e.g., degrees, Newtons, etc.)

The built-in TERMINAL application lets you talk to any application using a text-based interface. All of our built-in applications support command-line control (for example, see the command-line help for the IO application in the figure on the right). You can also use our TERMINAL application for interacting with your own custom programs.

For the greatest amount of control, develop your own custom applications in C/C++ using AVR development tools such as the open-source WinAVR. Then, just type in your HEX file name, press the Install button, and our program installs your application. It couldn’t be easier.

For quick experimentation, install the free Bitlash application and start programming your GATOR Plus+ right away without any compilation or downloading. This is an interactive interpreter that lets you directly set pins high and low, read A/D values, set time delays, etc. as well as write small programs.

Develop your own custom applications in C or C++ using the cross-platform open-source Arduino development system and take advantage of the many available libraries and example programs. Just press Ctrl-U to compile your application and install it into the GATOR Plus+ board.