GSM Shield

We made a major breakthrough today. We got the GSM shield working. Initially, we were concerned as we had heard that the GSM shield could draw up to 2A of current. This would not do an Arduino much good, so it seemed to be a bit of a risk.
We connected the Arduino to the USB on a computer and used a GSM example to send a text...

/*
 SMS sender

 This sketch, for the Arduino GSM shield,sends an SMS message
 you enter in the serial monitor. Connect your Arduino with the
 GSM shield and SIM card, open the serial monitor, and wait for
 the "READY" message to appear in the monitor. Next, type a
 message to send and press "return". Make sure the serial
 monitor is set to send a newline when you press return.

 Circuit:
 * GSM shield
 * SIM card that can send SMS

 created 25 Feb 2012
 by Tom Igoe

 This example is in the public domain.

 http://arduino.cc/en/Tutorial/GSMExamplesSendSMS

 */

// Include the GSM library
#include <GSM.h>

#define PINNUMBER ""

// initialize the library instance
GSM gsmAccess;
GSM_SMS sms;

void setup()
{
  // initialize serial communications and wait for port to open:
  Serial.begin(9600);
  while (!Serial) {
    ; // wait for serial port to connect. Needed for Leonardo only
  }
 
  Serial.println("SMS Messages Sender");

  // connection state
  boolean notConnected = true;

  // Start GSM shield
  // If your SIM has PIN, pass it as a parameter of begin() in quotes
  while(notConnected)
  {
    if(gsmAccess.begin(PINNUMBER)==GSM_READY)
      notConnected = false;
    else
    {
      Serial.println("Not connected");
      delay(1000);
    }
  }
 
  Serial.println("GSM initialized");
}

void loop()
{

  Serial.print("Enter a mobile number: ");
  char remoteNum[20];  // telephone number to send sms
  readSerial(remoteNum);
  Serial.println(remoteNum);
   
  // sms text
  Serial.print("Now, enter SMS content: ");
  char txtMsg[200];
  readSerial(txtMsg);
  Serial.println("SENDING");
  Serial.println();
  Serial.println("Message:");
  Serial.println(txtMsg);
 
  // send the message
  sms.beginSMS(remoteNum);
  sms.print(txtMsg);
  sms.endSMS();
  Serial.println("\nCOMPLETE!\n");
}

/*
  Read input serial
 */
int readSerial(char result[])
{
  int i = 0;
  while(1)
  {
    while (Serial.available() > 0)
    {
      char inChar = Serial.read();
      if (inChar == '\n')
      {
        result[i] = '\0';
        Serial.flush();
        return 0;
      }
      if(inChar!='\r')
      {
        result[i] = inChar;
        i++;
      }
    }
  }
}

We found that there was an issue with the serial print in the script. When the serial monitor was "Asking" for a number and we typed it in, the script didn't work. When Brodie rewrote the script to include a stated number it sent a text message. In fact it continued to send messages...
Ten of them in a minute. This of course isn't a problem as the script is simply doing what it is told to do.
Next stage back to getting the dot matrix LED screen to display through the serial monitor...
The GSM needs it's metadata removing too - we don't want that to be displayed.

Updates to Arduino IDE

The Arduino web site has details of the upcoming release of the latest version of their IDE.
Current version is 1.05. Version 1.5 has been released in BETA. If you are really brave there are nightlies too...
Arduino 1.5.6-r2 BETA