slip.js

slip.js is a JavaScript library for encoding and decoding Serial Line Internet Protocol packets. It works in both Node.js and in a web browser.

How Do I Use It?

slip.js provides two pieces of functionality: encoding and decoding messages.

Encoding

Encoding is stateless and synchronous. slip.encode() takes any array-like object containing bytes, such as a Uint8Array, Node.js Buffer, ArrayBuffer, or plain JavaScript Array. It returns a Uint8Array containing the encoded message.

Example

var message = new Uint8Array([99, 97, 116, 33]);
var slipEncoded = slip.encode(message); // Result is [192, 99, 97, 33, 192]

Options

Option	Type	Description	Default value
bufferPadding	Number	_Optional_. The number of bytes to add to the message's length when initializing the encoder's internal buffer.	4
offset	Number	_Optional_. An offset index into the data argument to start reading the message from.	undefined
byteLength	Number	_Optional_. The number of bytes of the data argument to read.	undefined

Decoding

Decoding is stateful and asynchronous. You need to instantiate a slip.Decoder object, providing a callback that will be invoked whenever a complete message is received. By default, messages are limited to 10 MB in size. You can increase this value by providing a maxBufferSize option to the Decoder constructor, specified in bytes.

To decode a SLIP packet, call decode(). Whenever the slip.Decoder detects the end of an incoming message, it will call its onMessage callback.

Example

var logMessage = function (msg) {
    console.log("A SLIP message was received! Here is it: " + msg);
};

var decoder = new slip.Decoder({
    onMessage: logMessage,
    maxMessageSize: 209715200,
    bufferSize: 2048
});

decoder.decode(packet);
decoder.decode(otherPacket);

Options

Option	Type	Description	Default value
bufferSize	Number	_Optional_. The initial size of the decoder's internal buffer. It will be resized as necessary.	1024
maxMessageSize	Number	_Optional_. The maximum size of incoming messages, in bytes. Messages larger than this value will cause the onError callback to be invoked.	10485760 (10 MB)
onMessage	Function	A callback that will be invoked whenever a complete message is decoded.	undefined
onError	Function	A callback that will be invoked whenever an error occurs.	undefined

Events

The onMessage callback's signature is:

Argument	Type	Description
msg	Uint8Array	The decoded message, with SLIP characters removed.

The onError callback's signature is:

Argument	Type	Description
msgBuffer	Uint8Array	A copy of the internal message buffer.
errorMsg	String	The error message.

License

slip.js is written by Colin Clark and distributed under the MIT and GPL 3 licenses.