pynqc 0.1

Wrapper for the nqc executable

pynqc NQC wrapper

pynqc is a python wrapper for the NQC executable. It utilizes the subprocess module for communitcation with NQC. The wrapper is not complete, but should be easy to update.

Requirements

The package does not include the NQC executeable it has to be built and installed from https://github.com/jverne/nqc/

There is also Dockerfile in this repo which downloads source and a patch to enable usb support for nqc.

https://github.com/jverne/nqc/ also provides the firmware needed to be flashed onto the RCX device for running progams. The Dockerfile in the repo downloads those aswell.

Layout

pynqc consists of two modules:

• nqc and the Nqc class
• raw_functions and the RawFunctions class, enables us to execute op_codes on
• the rcx from the host. It does so by generating the instruction and calls the Nqc objects exec_raw which essentially executes nqc -Susb:/some/path/to/legotower -raw

Example usage

import time

import pynqc
from pynqc import raw_functions as rf

compilation_flags = ["-DOVERRIDE", f"-DVERSION={1}", f"-DID={189}"]

# An nqc instance requires knowledge of where it can find the lego IR tower
nqc = pynqc.Nqc(serial_type="usb", device="/dev/usb/legousbtower0")

# Raw functions also requires access to the lego IR tower
# Therefore the nqc module has utility function which provides
# an initialized raw_functions object

raw_func = nqc.get_raw_functions()

try:
    _ = raw_func.is_alive()
except IOError as err:
    if err.errno == 255:
        print(err.strerror)
else:
    _ = nqc.flash_firmware("./firm0309.lgo")
    _ = nqc.flash_and_exec_application("../tests/test.nqc", compilation_flags)
    time.sleep(1)
    raw_func.set_motor_state(rf.MOTOR_A, rf.IMMEDIATE, rf.MOTOR_ON)
    time.sleep(1)
    raw_func.set_motor_state(rf.MOTOR_A, rf.IMMEDIATE, rf.MOTOR_OFF)

Credit

Kekoa Proudfoot : http://www.mralligator.com/rcx/ This site helped a lot when implementing the raw functions from the documented op_codes.