(superseeded) Linuxcnc on Linux Mint 19.3 quick and easy installation

OK .HAL now looks like this (and I know that .HAL is not in uppercase - I am using uppercase simply for visibility)

loadrt [EMCMOT]EMCMOT base_period_nsec=[EMCMOT]BASE_PERIOD servo_period_nsec=[EMCMOT]SERVO_PERIOD num_joints=[KINS]JOINTS
#loadrt hal_parport cfg="0xe030 out 0xe020 in"
loadrt hal_parport cfg="0xe000 out"
#loadrt hal_parport cfg="0 out"
loadrt stepgen step_type=0,0,0

I now get 1 error when I start LinuxCNC:

Linux parallel port @57344 not found

(two errors down to one - that's progress )

Not that this forum 'owes' me anything... but I'm feeling a tad abandoned here. I know I've been 'gone' as well - I was struggling with my wireless dongle and finally determined it was the device itself... although much younger than me - it seems to have died.

But I'm back to torment you yet again (new TP-LINK dongle plugged in and just worked!!)

In the .HAL, I updated the line:
#loadrt hal_parport cfg="0 out" ==> loadrt hal_parport cfg="0xe000 out"\

That reduced my error count on startup from 2 lines to one line of error - but the info in the remaining line is different (we didn't eliminate one - we replaced 2 errors with 1 new).

I took the PC out to the shop and hooked it up to the CNC machine - hoping it might be something that was not catastrophic (the eternal optimist in me) but I was wrong. LinuxCNC loads however I am unable to 'power it on' (icon in upper left corner... F2 key). In the low end of the lower left corner of the LinuxCNC window - it shows "ESTOP". I did attempt to comment out the ESTOP configuration pin (10) in the parallel port assignment to see if somehow LinuxCNC was reading the pins incorrectly - but that didn't help.

I did run StepConf at the beginning and assigned all the pins identically as it was inside my Wheezy system. I've compared the .hal and .ini files from my Wheezy install to this Mint install - there are significant differences but as I think I understand it - this is a newer install of LinuxCNC and there have been changes to how it's configured (ie 'joints' instead of 'axis')

I have executed:

lspci | grep Par

which produces:

02:00.0 Parallel controller: SUNIX Co., Ltd. Multiport serial controller

It's a single parallel port board and it seems that Mint has recognized it.

Any more ideas? I am quite happy to 'nuke and repave' this install to start again if necessary. Again... any help is greatly appreciated. (if you need more technical info - please let me know what more I can get)

Arden

Can you try this
And report back all the info regarding the parallel port. And make sure the Vendor ID Device ID

Here it is:

02:00.0 0701: 1fd4:1999 (prog-if 03 [IEEE1284])
Subsystem: 1fd4:0100
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 11
I/O ports at e030
I/O ports at e020
I/O ports at e000
Capabilities: [60] Power Management version 3
Capabilities: [68] MSI: Enable- Count=1/32 Maskable+ 64bit+
Capabilities: [80] Express Legacy Endpoint, MSI 00
Capabilities: [100] Advanced Error Reporting


Interesting note... every other entry begins with 00:nn.n. I suspect that the 02:nn.n represents the 'channel' number of the board since it is an add-on card and not part of the internal circuitry...

Thanks!
Arden

Can you run dmesg and look for any references to the parallel port ?

Just a single line:
awalde@WoodShop:~$ dmesg | grep parall
[ 10.334464] ppdev: user-space parallel port driver
awalde@WoodShop:~$

I also 'grepped' for Error and Warning to see if anything 'popped' but obviously nothing for the parallel port as there was just one line returned.

Standing by - ready for the next check

Ok that grep command is a little too specfiic, you might need a wider net
The -i switch ignores case.

Another thing either of these could be the base address of the parallel port
I/O ports at e030
I/O ports at e020
I/O ports at e000

Or you have one of those dicky boards that is set up by the manufacturer's driver.

I reran the query with '-i' and got back TONS of lines - none of which really appeared to have anything to do with the parallel port. So then I reran it with ... | grep -i " par" (to ensure the word retrieved started with 'par' - and that produced nothing of interest either:

awalde@WoodShop:~$ dmesg | grep -i " par"
[ 0.034056] Booting paravirtualized kernel on bare hardware
[ 0.885062] Asymmetric key parser 'x509' registered
[ 1.101515] xhci_hcd 0000:00:14.0: hcc params 0x200077c1 hci version 0x100 quirks 0x0000000000009810
[ 1.239572] ahci 0000:00:1f.2: flags: 64bit ncq pm led clo pio slum part ems apst
[ 10.334464] ppdev: user-space parallel port driver

After I post this response - I'm going to take the system apart and pull the board to see if there is anything 'identifiable' about it... maybe even some configuration jumpers.

I do wonder if there is perhaps another approach... the 'wheezy' instance of LinuxCNC has no trouble with this board. I know that the LinuxCNC version is changed from what I was running in wheezy, but is there anything I can maybe 'pull' from the wheezy installation that will provide more information on why it's not working Mint? As I've said - I have dual boot- so I can pop over to Wheezy and work there (I just have to use my network cable because my WiFi subsystem seems to have disappeared - even with my new WiFi dongle)

Boot up clean.
Then try loading linuxcnc with the same parport line that works with Wheezy.