The MATLAB/Octave bindings allow you to control Bricks and Bricklets from your MATLAB/Octave programs. The ZIP file for the bindings contains:
The MATLAB/Octave bindings are based on the Java bindings.
Before you and use the bindings with MATLAB or Octave you have to install them.
The Java support in MATLAB is typically enabled by default. You can test this with the following command in MATLAB:
version -java
To install the bindings copy the Tinkerforge.jar file from the matlab/ folder to the MATLAB program folder. On Windows this folder is typically located here for MATLAB R2014a:
C:\Program Files\MATLAB\R2014a
On Linux it is here:
/usr/local/matlab/r2014a
On Mac OS X it is here:
/Applications/MATLAB_R2014a.app
Then the new Java library has to be added to MATLAB's class path. Edit the following file:
<MATLAB program folder>/toolbox/local/classpath.txt
and append the following line to it:
$matlabroot/Tinkerforge.jar
After restarting MATLAB the bindings are ready to use.
If Java support is available in Octave depends on the Octave version. Until version 3.6 (inclusive) Java support was in a separate module. Since version 3.8 it is available by default.
But in Octave 3.8 callbacks don't work, see the known problems section. We recommend Octave 3.6 for now.
On Linux you have to install an extra package for the Java support in Octave 3.6:
sudo apt-get install octave octave-java
For Windows we recommend the MinGW build of Octave, because it comes with Java support by default. The Octave Wiki has a guide about how to set up Octave for Windows.
You can test if Java support is available with the following command in Octave:
octave_config_info("features").JAVA
To make the bindings available in Octave the Tinkerforge.jar from the octave/ folder has to be added to Octave's class path. This can be done with the following Octave command on Windows:
javaaddpath("C:\\Absolute\\path\\to\\Octave\\Tinkerforge.jar");
Or by this Octave command on Linux:
javaaddpath("/Absolute/path/to/Octave/Tinkerforge.jar");
To make this change persistent you can add the command to the following file on Linux:
~/.octaverc
If this file didn't exist yet you can just create it. Octave has to be restarted after changing this file.
To test a MATLAB/Octave example Brick Daemon and Brick Viewer have to be installed first. Brick Daemon acts as a proxy between the USB interface of the Bricks and the API bindings. Brick Viewer connects to Brick Daemon and helps to figure out basic information about the connected Bricks and Bricklets.
As an example we will run the Stepper Brick configuration example. To do this open the matlab_example_configuration.m file from the matlab/examples/brick/stepper/ folder in MATLAB.
In the example HOST and PORT specify at which network address the Stepper Brick can be found. If it is connected locally to USB then localhost and 4223 is correct. The UID value has to be changed to the UID of the connected Stepper Brick, which you can figure out using Brick Viewer:
HOST = 'localhost';
PORT = 4223;
UID = 'XYZ'; % Change to your UID
Now you're ready to test the examples.
As an example we will run the Stepper Brick configuration example. To do this open the octave_example_configuration.m file from the octave/examples/brick/stepper/ folder in Octave.
In the example HOST and PORT specify at which network address the Stepper Brick can be found. If it is connected locally to USB then localhost and 4223 is correct. The UID value has to be changed to the UID of the connected Stepper Brick, which you can figure out using Brick Viewer:
HOST = "localhost";
PORT = 4223;
UID = "XYZ"; % Change to your UID
Now you're ready to test the examples.
In Octave 3.8 the Invoke function throws an java.lang.UnsatisfiedLinkError exception. The Invoke function is allows to call Octave functions from Java. The bindings use this for callbacks. This means that you cannot use callbacks in Octave 3.8. A discussion on the Octave mailing list didn't come to a conclusion of fix for this yet. Because of this we recommend Octave 3.6 for now. This version is not affected by this problem and the bindings works without any problems.
Links to the API reference for the IP Connection, Bricks and Bricklets as well as the examples from the ZIP file of the bindings are listed in the following table. Further project descriptions can be found in the Starter Kits section.