ii.<module>.help() truncated to 1024chars

[csboling]

With crow v1.0.2, in druid I see the following:

> ii.kria.help()

> print('****CAW!')
-- commands
ii.kria.preset( number )
ii.kria.pattern( number )
ii.kria.scale( number )
ii.kria.period( time )
ii.kria.position( track, param, pos )
ii.kria.loop_start( track, param, pos )
ii.kria.loop_length( track, param, pos )
ii.kria.reset( track, param )
ii.kria.mute( track, state )
ii.kria.toggle_mute( track )
ii.kria.clock( track )
-- request params
ii.kria.get( 'preset' )
ii.kria.get( 'pattern' )
ii.kria.get( 'scale' )
ii.kria.get( 'period' )
ii.kria.get( 'position', track, param )
ii.kria.get( 'loop_start', track, param )
ii.kria.get( 'loop_length', track, param )
ii.kria.get( 'reset', track )
ii.kria.get( 'mute', track )
ii.kria.get( 'cv', track )
-- then receive
ii.kria.event = function( e, data )
  if e == 'preset' then
    -- handle preset param here
  elseif e == 'pattern' then
  elseif e == 'scale' then
  elseif e == 'period' then
  elseif e == 'position' then
  elseif e == 'loop_start' then
  elseif e == 'loop_length' then
  elseif e == 'reset' then
  elseif e == 'mut****CAW!

This only currently affects ii.kria.help because the string is long enough that it can't be sent in a single Caw_send_luachunk. Not sure what the preferred way is to handle this in general.

[trentgill]

Hrmmm... Caw_send_luachunk is limited only by the USB TX buffer (currently 1024bytes).

The brute force solution is just allocating a bigger buffer (at the expense of runtime memory).

We could add some complex code to break a string into 1024byte chunks here. This would require an arbitrary delay, waiting for the usb buffer to be cleared, or a callback from the usb tx driver, or some kind of queue system. This seems like massive overkill to me.

We could break up the ii.<module>.help() into separate parts. Or take an optional string argument like 'commands' or 'events' which would only print the part you were interested in.

We could shorten the .event helpstring and just provide a single example, requiring the user to write their own. This could be done conditionally at compile time if the string is >1024 bytes.

Other ideas? How small of a use-case is this?

[csboling]

We could break up the ii..help() into separate parts. Or take an optional string argument like 'commands' or 'events' which would only print the part you were interested in.

This sounds like probably the easiest thing - separate sections for commands / getters / event handler example? However implementing all TXo commands would probably run into this limit for each section.

[trentgill]

@csboling i just renamed this issue to reflect the problem so i stop skipping over it bc it says kria :~)

[trentgill]

I'm closing this one as it feels like too much to be asking of crow. We'd need some drastic restructuring of the serial stream and/or i2c help saving, which feels outside the scope for this small of an issue.

[trentgill]

Reopening as an extra 1kB of RAM doesn't actually seem like a big problem after further usage.