Virtual COM Ports

General Usage

• Virtual Serial Ports are used to bring COM port compatibility to newer devices/OSs.
• They can be used if the target device has no COM ports whatsoever to create a virtual one or to extend capabilities of existing COM port in situations where the old COM port is missing funcionality.

  1. Device has no COM port

  • In this situation a third party software creates a network layer between the physical interface (eg. USB or Ethernet) and all data are translated both ways before sending it in either direction

  2. Extending existing COM port

  • If device already has a COM port but lacks some capabalities a third party software can be used to create a software layer that can provide these.

Creating a VCOM

• Virtual Serial Port is usually running on one physical port
• If multiple physical ports are running a VCOM many problems can occure if physical interfaces are not properly mapped to other names
• It's also possible to run multiple sessions on physical port using several VCOMs that refere to that one port

VCOM Splitting

• Create Virtual COM for each real interface allowing multiple applications running at once on each of the linked VCOMs

VCOM Mapping

• Map physical interfaces to other names using aliases

VCOM Joining

• Join multiple Virtual Serial Ports or Physical Serial Ports to one VCOM allowing one application access multiple devices on different Physical Ports

Third party software that supports joining:

https://freeserialportsplitter.com/

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_COM_port
https://freeserialportsplitter.com/
https://www.netburner.com/learn/how-to-create-a-virtual-serial-port/
https://www.rbdinstruments.com/blog/resolving-usb-conflicts-with-virtual-com-ports/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COM_(hardware_interface)