QSerialPort read string with "readAll()"

[Basti46]

Hi guys,
this is my first post and i am still a newbie. So far my application works just fine. But there is one problem. We need to read the data from the serialport. This data may contain only bytes so reading with the readLine() function could give us false or no data. Here is the code now so you can understand my problem.

void MainWindow::readData()
{
  //get data from serialport
  while(serial->canReadLine())
  {
       QByteArray data = serial->readLine();
       
       emit serialPortData(data, false);

       QString myString(data);
       if(myString.startsWith("SensorUpdate"))
       emit sensorData(myString) ;
  }

}

I am reading data and if it starts with a string ( some values ) i will send those values to another class where it will update a QTableWidget. But this "startsWith()" only works if i read line by line from the serial port. i want to use the readAll function and maybe store the chars until a new line is found or something like that. Can you help me?

Thanks!

tl;dr use readAll() to read line by line

[mrjj]

Hi and welcome ;)

If you look at Terminal Example you see how to connect up
the readyRead signal and use readall()

Normally when you do serial reading. you
will read into a buffer (append to it) until u have the expected number of bytes or a
"end of transmission" char is seen. like newline.
Then a copy of buffer is send to processing and the buffer is cleared and it starts over.

[Basti46]

Thanks for your answer!
I tried to adjust my code and got this here:

header: QByteArray charBuffer;
....
void MainWindow::readData()
{
    QByteArray data = serial->readAll();
    console->putData(data,false);
    charBuffer.append(data);
    if (data.contains("\n")) //read into a structure until newline received.
    {
        QString myString(charBuffer);            
        if(myString.startsWith("SensorUpdate"))
        emit sensorData(myString);              
        charBuffer = "";                       
    }
}

But it still doesn't work :(

[mrjj]

hi have you checked that input actually do contain "\n" ?
Also which part is not working ?
Does it enter
if (data.contains("\n")) //read into a structure until newline received.
{
...

or not?

Code does look fine :)

[Basti46]

@mrjj The data i receive is correct. I used the debugger and got these results:
data = "\r\nSensorupdate ,var1,var2,var3"
myString ="\r\nSensorupdate ,var1,var2,var3";

But the if statement does not work. The string is not emitted. I tried to use several if statements ("contains("\r\nSensorupdate","containts("Sensorupdate"),startsWirth("\r\nSensorupdate"). All of them dont seem to work.

I tried my original code again to make sure nothing changed and yes it still works with the readLine() function... Darnnnn!

[mrjj]

@Basti46
Ok try with indexof
http://doc.qt.io/qt-5/qstring.html#indexOf
and Qt::CaseInsensitive

i do wonder why containts("Sensorupdate") dont see it.

Seems your \n comes first in data ?

[Basti46]

@mrjj
Sooooo i think i found the problems!

data from serialPort Example:
does work
"Sensorupdate ,var1,var2\r\n";
does not work yet
"\r\n"Sensorupdate ,var1,var2";
does not work
"Sensorupdate ,Sensor1,var2\r\n";
"Sensorupdate ,Sensor2,var2\r\n";

If i get more than one line at each run my gui is not able to handle the data. The readAll function is too fast and gives too much data too handle at a time. I need to handle each line one by one but the readAll function gives me several lines. Soo a solution would be to store the data into a file and read it from there. But maybe there is something else.
Thanks @mrjj for ur time :D

[mrjj]

hi
in you GUI
you could split the QString into a list
http://doc.qt.io/qt-5/qstring.html#split
split on \n
Then loop the list and handle each as you normally would.
So would not matter if u get more than one in as input.

[Basti46]

@mrjj Right! I did not check if my Sensorupdate Class got the data so maybe there is the data but my current code was not able to use it! I will update soon

[Basti46]

@mrjj
Thank you sooo much!! It finally worked.

void SensorWidget::fillTable(QString serialString)
{
   tempList = serialString.split("\r\n");

   for(int i=0;i<tempList.size();i++)
   {
       //filll table code
   }
}

This is what i had to do.

[mrjj]

@Basti46
Good work!
:)