Setup A New Shared Phidgets Server

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For each SharedPhidgets infrastructure of different connected computers with Phidget devices you need ONE server. The SharedPhidgets server tool opens a new shared dictionary, and can distribute the dictionary entries to all clients.

Before starting the server

  1. Network: Make sure that your network is already installed and configured.
  2. IP: You have to run the server on a computer with a public IP if you want to connect from any internet computer to this server. If you only use computers in a subnet, then a local subnet IP might be sufficient.
  3. Firewall: You have to configure your firewall to open the port of the server; usually, a message of your firewall will appear when the server tries to open the shared dictionary, so you can confirm this access.

Setup a new server

1) Of course you have to install the SharedPhidgets toolkit on the computer where you want to run the server (Installation Instructions).

2) Start the server program: Start -> All Programs -> GroupLab -> SharedPhidgets -> Server

3) The 'Getting started' dialog window will appear. All the necessary steps are explained there; you have to specify the port of the server (the default is 'sp', for SharedPhidgets) and write down the IP address, because you need this address for all the applications you develop with the toolkit.
4) As explained in the dialog window, press the Start server button.

5) The server software will now open the shared dictionary, and an icon will appear in the Windows traybar. When you move your mouse over this icon, you can see a tooltip text with the current status of the server (Connected/Disconnected) and the IP address of the server.

6) You can right-click in the icon to see the context menu. You can show and hide the status display of the server. You can also double-click the icon to see this status display.

7) The status display shows the current IP of the server, the status (Connected/Disconnected) and buttons for switsching between connect and disconnect, and to close the server (to activate the Close Server button, simply click on the checkbox of the button and the button will be enabled).

6) Finished! The server is running, and you can use the SharedPhidget Connector tool to share Phidget devices using this server.