Anyone who ever plans on connecting terminals, printers, modems, or personal computers to anything else should get this book prior to attempting the interconnections. This guidebook employs a railroad analogy to describe the EIA RS-232-C standard for serial interface. The analogy works well, as almost all aspects of the RS-232-C standard are explained in easy to understand terms. The figures and examples aid in the explanation and, at times, are humorous to boot.

This book is 214 pages long including the index, but the textual, “MADE EASY,” part of the book takes up only 76 of those pages. The remainder of the book is composed of appendices which contain a plethora of information: extracts from the EIA RS-232-C and EIA RS-449 standards documents, an RS-232-C circuit summary, a short description of tools of the trade, and more.

By far the most important parts of this book are Appendices F and G. Appendix F is a list of RS-232 pin assignments for most common and many uncommon computers and peripherals. This alphabetized list of 230 devices not only describes the signal assignments (pin-outs) for the serial port on a device, but also assigns a Pin Configuration Code. Appendix G contains two tables, one for computers and printers, the other for computers and terminals. After locating the devices to be connected in Appendix F and noting the correct Pin Configuration Codes, one need only use those codes to look up a Cable Diagram Code in the Appendix G tables. The Cable Diagram Code directs the reader to a figure showing exactly how to construct and attach a cable so that the devices to be connected will communicate as desired.

I highly recommend this book both as a tutorial on the RS-232-C standard and also, more importantly, as a reference guide to be kept close at hand whenever serial devices are to be connected to one another.