hi again

i do prefere to out an in data via a parallel port but, that kind of port tends to dissapear (lamentably). Out_port only is supported in comercial version as i saw and has another trouble: accesing hardware directly is not well seen by the operating sistem so the nt based windows restrict that kind of instructions. I saw something that this command doesn't work porperly under vista or even xp don't remember.

about serial communication, just for test you should conect two ports on the same machine, or with two machines if you have, one instance running an hyperterminal and the other with a software made in litec to test. One important thing is that if you have a usb-to-serial converter both cables are terminated with a male connector and we have to do (construct or buy) a crossover cable that has two female connectors with pin 2 connected with 3 and 3 with 2 and 5 with 5.

if you want to do some thing like tun on/off lights or sense key's etc, you probably need a microcontroller on the other end. If this is the case you have to have a development board or if you has some soldering skills i could send some schematics to work with PIC's: microcontrllers from Microchip.

there are some cheap programmers or should be home made with few components.
about the code for the microcontroller, i'm a teacher in this area and have some code that i give to my student's so i could e-mail you. If you win 1000000 dolars (beter if euros) send me some please! (je)

best regards
Juan