bridge: drive the Z1 from the desktop build — discover, identify, upload a verified .nc

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#255 7 comments 0 reactions 0 assignees View on GitHub

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Assessment

Difficulty
5/5
Estimated time
Over a week
Newbie friendliness
25/100
Issue type
Feature
Clarity
Clearly specified
Activity status
Active
Tech stack
tauri, typescript
Domain
backend, desktop

Research direction

Start with /Fabrication.md §5.7 and /Makera-Parity.md, then complete the blocked platform seam in #181. Before opening CarveraController files, write a protocol description in the repo from protocol facts only; implement and test from Windows. Done means desktop-only discovery and identification, verified .nc upload, and honest controller status reporting, with no unverified-send path.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Description

enhancement fabrication

What this is

Drive the machine from the desktop build: discover it, confirm it is the right one, upload a verified .nc, and report what the controller says back.

It has never been filed. CNC-4 was named "Bridge, camera, V-carve" and contained no bridge issue, while /Fabrication.md §5.7 describes the work in detail and #181 exists specifically to make room for it. That gap is why "we do not drive the machine" kept getting used as a premise elsewhere — most recently in /Makera-Parity.md §14.4 R1 — with nothing to point at.

Blocked by #181 (the platform seam). §5.7's instruction is explicit: build the seam before the bridge, so bridge work does not scatter platform checks through the UI.

What is already known — do not re-derive it

From /Fabrication.md §5.7 and /Makera-Parity.md:

  • Tauri-only. The web build cannot open a socket; this is the capability that makes the desktop build exist (#181's table).
  • Transport is WiFi (decision 10), with a transport interface behind the protocol layer so USB can follow.
  • It must be developed and tested from Windows. WSL2's NAT will almost certainly break UDP discovery, and the Tauri build has to run on Windows anyway (CLAUDE.md).
  • M482.5 returns the machine's IP and M482.4 its MAC — that is how we confirm we are talking to the right machine rather than a neighbour's.
  • The connection surface is documented in Z1/QuickStart: USB, the machine's own AP-mode hotspot (SSID prefix Makera Z1), or a shared local network, with WiFi credentials pushed over Bluetooth from Studio or the mobile app.
  • There is no protocol to reverse-engineer. Makera publish MakeraInc/CarveraController; WIFIStream.py, USBStream.py, XMODEM.py, CNC.py and Controller.py describe transport, discovery and file transfer.

⚠ Licence constraint — it binds before anyone opens those files

CarveraController is GPL-3.0; Case Maker is Apache-2.0. GPL-3.0 code cannot be copied or adapted into this repo. CarveraProfiles is worse: no licence at all, which means all rights reserved.

Protocol facts — port numbers, framing, command sequences — are interoperability information and fine to learn and reimplement. Code, comments and files are not. Write the bridge from a written-down description of the protocol, not with the Python open beside it. Whoever does this should produce that written description first, in the repo, and implement from it.

Scope for a first pass

  1. Discover a machine on the LAN, and in AP mode.
  2. Identify it — M482.5 / M482.4 — and show the user which machine they are about to talk to.
  3. Upload a .nc that has already passed the verifier (#174) and the gated action (#206). Nothing reaches the machine that has not been verified; that is the whole architecture of CNC-2.
  4. Report status back honestly, including the machine refusing something.

Explicitly out of a first pass: jog, DRO, MDI, pendant (§14.4 R10), and anything that moves the machine from the app without a file.

What this unblocks when it lands

  • §14.4 R10 (jog / DRO / MDI) — refused today because there is no bridge, with this as the named gate.
  • §14.4 R1 part 3 — connect / discover / home as real first-run steps, on the desktop build only (#254 covers the web-capable halves now).
  • #212's read of Makera's feeds/speeds SQLite, and #131's filesystem board library, both of which ride the same platform seam.

Do not

  • Do not start before #181. The seam is the point.
  • Do not copy from CarveraController. Read it, write down the protocol, implement from the writing.
  • Do not send anything unverified, and do not add a "send anyway" path.
Dominant language
TypeScript
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First steps

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  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

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