HICAPS integration – Basic Troubleshooting

Spinalogic communicates with the HICAPS terminal via the HICAPS Connect software. For Spinalogic to be able to connect to your HICAPS terminal, the terminal must be visible by the HICAPS connect software. If this is not the case, please follow the steps below and then contact the HICAPS Help Desk if you are still having issues on 1800 650 852.

Verifying your connection – Serial vs USB Adapter

In order for your HICAPS terminal to connect to the computer, a physical connection is required between the two. Depending on the ports available on your computer, you may be connecting via a Serial Cable or a Serial to USB Adapter supplied by HICAPS.

Serial Cable

Keyspan Serial to USB Adapter

If you are connecting via a serial cable, only the HICAPS Connect software itself is required. If you are connecting through a serial to USB adapter, you may also need to install the adapter drivers. The model currently supplied by HICAPS is a Keyspan USA-19HS, which includes an installation CD.

Local HICAPS terminal cannot be found

One of the most common issues users encounter is that the local HICAPS terminal cannot be found. This could be due to a faulty cable, HICAPS terminal or the destination port on your computer. It could also be software related with Windows or the HICAPS Connect software not properly detecting the connection.

If you receive any notification stating the local terminal cannot be found, first confirm if the HICAPS Connect software can find the terminal in the bottom right-hand corner of your screen.

A YELLOW icon shows that a HICAPS terminal has been found.

Please keep in mind if you have multiple terminals the particular terminal you are searching for may still be disconnected. Hovering your mouse over the yellow icon will display more information on the terminals found.

If the HICAPS Connect software is detecting the terminal, please confirm HICAPS has been enabled in Front Desk from the Advanced tab of System Information before restarting Front Desk.
If the icon is RED, the HICAPS software is not detecting any HICAPS terminals.

When a terminal has not been found, it is recommended you first check the physical connection to your computer. It is possible the cable has come loose, or it may have been disconnected.

After checking the physical connection is properly in place, right-click on the HICAPS Connect icon and select Re-scan for HICAPS Terminals. If the terminal has only briefly lost connectivity, this may re-establish the connection.

If the terminal still cannot be found, the next step is to restart the HICAPS service entirely. To do this right-click the HICAPS Connect icon and select Diagnose Problems.

Now click the Stop HICAPS Svc button to stop the service. It may take a few seconds for the service to stop entirely.

Once the HICAPS service has been stopped, click the Start HICAPS Svc button to restart the service. This can also assist in finding missing terminals.

If either of these solutions finds the terminal, please restart Front Desk to re-establish the integration with HICAPS Connect. Your HICAPS integration should now be working.

If your terminal can still not be found by the HICAPS Connect software, or the icon remains RED, please contact the HICAPS Help Desk for further assistance on 1800 650 852.

If the HICAPS Connect software has found the terminal and the icon is YELLOW, please first confirm HICAPS integration has been properly enabled in Spinalogic before restarting the software. If problems persist please submit a ticket: ticket@spinalogic.org

Network HICAPS terminal cannot be found

If the HICAPS terminal that cannot be found isn’t connected directly to your computer, and is instead accessed via another computer on the network, there are additional troubleshooting steps that can be taken.

Before a HICAPS terminal can be shared across a network, it first needs to be found by the HICAPS Connect software of the computer it is connected to locally. The sharing computer needs to be turned ON and connecting to the network.

If the terminal has been found on the local machine, but cannot be found by network computers it may be being blocked by your firewall.

On the local machine, right-click the HICAPS icon and select Diagnose Problems.

On the right hand side of the window, a checklist will be displayed. Under the Windows Firewall section, you can confirm if the ports needed to connect are open in your firewall. As seen below a RED light shows a potential issue.

Please note if you have a third-party firewall in place you may also need to configure it to allow these ports.

Double-clicking on a checklist item will offer a ‘Recommendation’ on how to resolve the problem.

In this case we can see TCP port 11000 is blocked as well as UDP port 11001, and the recommendation is to add these ports as exceptions in the firewall.

To begin, load the Windows Firewall and navigate to the ‘Advanced Security’ section.

Under Inbound Rules select ‘New Rule…’ to add an exception.

Now follow the wizard to create a suitable firewall rule as below.

Firstly select Port to create a rule that controls connections for a TCP or UDP port, then click Next.

Leaving the protocol as TCP, select ‘Specific local ports’ and enter the first port 11000.

Click Next.

Ensure the rule is set to ‘Allow the connection’, and click Next.

Select when you would like this rule to apply. In most cases we only want this port to be accessible when a computer is connected to a corporate domain or private network location.

Enter a suitable Name for the rule, and click Finish.

An exception has now been added to the Windows Firewall for TCP port 11000. Next repeat this process for UDP port 11001.

For the following rule please be sure to select UDP instead of TCP, and name appropriately.

Congratulations, you have now successfully added Windows Firewall port exceptions for HICAPS.

You may also wish to add exceptions for the HICAPS programs, however it may not be necessary in order for network computers to connect to the terminal.

Once the exceptions have been added, return to the network computer and Re-scan for HICAPS terminals. The network HICAPS terminal should now be found.

If the terminal still cannot be found, you can also try restarting the service under Diagnose Problems.

If are still having difficulty with your HICAPS Connect software, or the icon remains RED, please contact HICAPS Customer Support for further assistance.

If the HICAPS Connect software has found the terminal and the icon is YELLOW, please first confirm HICAPS integration has been properly enabled in Spinalogic before restarting the software. If problems persist please submit a ticket: ticket@spinalogic.org

Sharing a HICAPS terminal over Remote Desktop
As many practices expand they often use Microsoft’s Remote Desktop Connection software to connect to remote computers or terminal servers. In this situation you may wish to use a local HICAPS terminal on a remote desktop connection, which is achievable by ‘sharing’ the HICAPS connecting port across to the destination computer.

First please ensure the HICAPS Connect software has been installed both locally and on the remote computer. The HICAPS terminal should already be found and accessible on the local machine.

Before connecting to the remote desktop, click Show Options to view the advanced connection options.

Navigate to the Local Resources tab and click ‘More…’

Enable Ports to be used in your remote session, and click OK.

If you now go back to the General tab, you may wish to save these Remote Desktop Connection settings to an icon on your desktop so they are remembered for next time.

After connecting to the remote desktop, the local HICAPS terminal should now to detected by the remote HICAPS Connect software and become available for integration.

If you require further assistance, please contact the HICAPS Help Desk on 1800 650 852 or your preferred general support technician.