> is there any way to order the labels in the history plot legend? In the old 
> system there was the “order” column in the config panel, but I can not find it 
> in the new system. Thanks in advance for the support.

correct, for reasons unknown, the function to reorder and to delete individual 
entries was removed from the history panel editor.

K.O.

> > is there any way to order the labels in the history plot legend? In the old 
> > system there was the “order” column in the config panel, but I can not find it 
> > in the new system. Thanks in advance for the support.
> 
> correct, for reasons unknown, the function to reorder and to delete individual 
> entries was removed from the history panel editor.
> 
> K.O.

https://bitbucket.org/tmidas/midas/issues/284/history-panel-editor-reordering-of

K.O.

Hello,
      I'm trying to build khyt1331 under scientific linux 5.5, kernel
2.6.18-238.9.1el5.  Has anyone succeeded with this.  So far, I've
managed to compile by hacking all the references to man9 pages out
of the makefile.  I've then hand installed the kernel driver with 
insmod.  cat /proc/khyt1331 produces 
Hytec 5331 card found at address 0xE800, using interrupt 10
Device not in use
CAMAC crate 0: responding
CAMAC crate 1: not responding
CAMAC crate 2: not responding
CAMAC crate 3: not responding 
and the "addr" LED blinks - so progress of some sort.  
There's no sign of /dev/camac.

Next up I'm going to compile stuff like camactest.c - though the 
makefiles in the drivers folder don't mention these, so I'll have to
work through what is needed by hand.   

At some point I'll have to rewrite a bit so that it all load automatically.

Any hints or tips greatfully received.

John McMillan

The linux kernel driver for the Universe-II VME to PCI bridge is updated to 
version -KO7. It now builds and runs with Debian-12 stock kernel 6.1.0-22-686.

I pxe boot (isolinux/pxelinux) the linux kernel and NFS-mount the stock 32-bit 
Debian-12 userland. Userland tarball is available by request. PXE and NFS-Root 
configuration is written up on the wiki at daq.triumf.ca, example config files 
are available on request.

https://daq00.triumf.ca/DaqWiki/index.php/Ubuntu#setup_diskless_network_booting
https://daq00.triumf.ca/DaqWiki/index.php/VME-CPU

The Debian-11 kernel also works (use -KO6 driver is -KO7 bombs), but Debian-11 
kernel with Debian-12 userland and Ubuntu-22 NFS server fails with "file too 
big" errors, the best I can tell this has to do with old 32-bit kernels getting 
unhappy about 64-bit NFS inode numbers.

Cross-compilation from 64-bit Ubuntu-22 to 32-bit VME processors running 32-bit 
Debian-12 is written up here:
https://daq00.triumf.ca/DaqWiki/index.php/Ubuntu#32-bit_intel_cross-compiler

To cross-build 32-bit MIDAS for 32-bit VME processor use "make linux32" or build 
natively (pretty slow on 1 GHz Pentium-III).

K.O.

> The linux kernel driver for the Universe-II VME to PCI bridge is updated to 
> version -KO7. It now builds and runs with Debian-12 stock kernel 6.1.0-22-686.

I have a report that this driver might work on 64-bit VME CPUs (minus a bug in the 
MIDAS VME library). I do not have such hardware, cannot test, cannot confirm. (All our 
64-bit VME CPUs have the tsi148 bridge and run Ubuntu kernels and userland).

https://daq00.triumf.ca/elog-midas/Midas/2566

K.O.

> > The linux kernel driver for the Universe-II VME to PCI bridge is updated to 
> > version -KO7. It now builds and runs with Debian-12 stock kernel 6.1.0-22-686.

Ahem, and the location is:

git clone https://daq00.triumf.ca/~olchansk/git/kernel-module-universe.git

K.O.

I added json-rpc requests for ODB /Script and /CustomScript (the first one shows up on the status page in the left hand side menu, the 
second one is "hidden", intended for use by custom pages).

To invoke the RPC method do this: (from mhttpd.js). Use parameter "customscript" instead of "script" to execute scripts from ODB 
/CustomScript.

One can identify the version of MIDAS that has this function implemented by the left hand side menu - the script links are placed by script 
buttons.

<pre>
function mhttpd_exec_script(name)
{
   //console.log("exec_script: " + name);
   var params = new Object;
   params.script = name;
   mjsonrpc_call("exec_script", params).then(function(rpc) {
      var status = rpc.result.status;
      if (status != 1) {
         dlgAlert("Exec script \"" + name + "\" status " + status);
      }
   }).catch(function(error) {
      mjsonrpc_error_alert(error);
   });
}
</pre>

The underlying code moved from mhttpd.cxx to the midas library as cm_exec_script(odb_path);

K.O.

For us it would be a handy feature if history data could be requested directly
from a custom page (time range or run based intervals) . Here I am not talking
about history plots but I am talking about recorded time series data. This way
we could easily generate useful graphs. For instance, if we measure the voltage
(constant current) while cooling, we could instantly get the resistance versus
temperature. Often we would like to 'correlate' recorded slow control data.

Is it already possible to extract history data the way suggested?

> For us it would be a handy feature if history data could be requested directly
> from a custom page (time range or run based intervals) . Here I am not talking
> about history plots but I am talking about recorded time series data. This way
> we could easily generate useful graphs. For instance, if we measure the voltage
> (constant current) while cooling, we could instantly get the resistance versus
> temperature. Often we would like to 'correlate' recorded slow control data.
> 
> Is it already possible to extract history data the way suggested?

There are sundry hs_read() json rpc methods already implemented in preparation
of writing a javascript based history viewer (did not happen yet).

You can try to use them, they should work, but have not been tested extensively.

To find this stuff:
a) go to the mhttpd "help" page, open the "json rpc schema in text table format", look for the "hs_xxx" methods.
b) also from the "help" page, open "javascript examples- example.html", scroll down to "hs_get_active_events". Press the buttons, they should 
work, look at the source code to see how to call the rpc methods from your own page.

K.O.

I am getting the following error alert in a custom page whenever a run starts

json parser exception: SyntaxError: Unexpected token < in JSON at position 985, batch request: method: "db_get_values", params: [object Object], id: 1598691925697 method: "get_alarms", params: null, id: 1598691925697 method: "cm_msg_retrieve", params: [object Object], id: 1598691925697 method: "cm_msg_retrieve", params: [object Object], id: 1598691925697

Does anyone know why and what causes this? This does not affect anything and things seem to continue running fine.

thanks.

> I am getting the following error alert in a custom page whenever a run starts
> json parser exception: SyntaxError: Unexpected token < in JSON at position 985, batch request: method: "db_get_values", params: [object Object], id: 1598691925697 method: "get_alarms", params: null, id: 1598691925697 method: "cm_msg_retrieve", params: [object Object], id: 1598691925697 method: "cm_msg_retrieve", params: [object Object], id: 1598691925697
> Does anyone know why and what causes this? This does not affect anything and things seem to continue running fine.

this is bug #242, https://bitbucket.org/tmidas/midas/issues/242/mjsonrpc-calls-should-return-valid-utf8

we read stuff from midas.log and push it to the web browser. we have seen this stuff
contain arbitrary binary data (both intentionally written into midas.log by cm_msg() and
file content corruption/truncation from computer crashes), the json decoder in the web browser
does not like that stuff - it is invalid utf-8 unicode - and throws an exception.

since we cannot ensure content of midas.log (and other files on disk) are always valid utf-8,
we have to sanitize it before sending it to the browser.

right now I am not sure of the best way to do this sanitizing. we do have a function to check
for valid utf-8 unicode, perhaps it should be extended to replace invalid unicode with spaces
or Xes or "?" or whatever, I am open to suggestions and ideas.

BTW, this is a new recent change to how strings generally work. C NUL-terminated strings are
permitted to contain arbitrary binary data (except for NUL char, of course). C++ std::string
are permitted to contain arbitrary binary data. but javascript strings are only permitted
to contain valid unicode, and the json standard was recently amended to require that json
strings are valid utf-8 unicode. So there is a disconnect between C/C++ code written in the
last 50 years where strings can contain binary data and the javascript world requiring
valid utf-8 unicode pretty much everywhere.

K.O.

MIDAS does not seem to be consistent (or at least convenient) with how it
handles booleans in AJAX functions.

When you request an ODB value that is a boolean with AJAX call like

http://neut14.triumf.ca:8081/?cmd=jcopy&odb=/Equipment/DCRC/Common/Hidden&format=json-nokeys

then you get

{ "Hidden/last_written" : 1437065425, "Hidden" : false }

This seems correct, since the JSON convention has booleans encoded as true/false.

But this convention does not work when trying to set the boolean value. For instance

http://neut14.triumf.ca:8081/?cmd=jset&odb=/Equipment/DCRC/Common/Hidden&format=json-nokeys&value=true

does not set the variable to true. To make this work you need to use the
characters y/n

http://neut14.triumf.ca:8081/?cmd=jset&odb=/Equipment/DCRC/Common/Hidden&format=json-nokeys&value=y

I tested this with ajax/jset, but the same problem seems to occur when using the
javascript function ODBSet. The documentation doesn't say what sort of encoding
to use when using these functions, so I guess the idea is that these functions
use MIDAS encoding for booleans. But it seems to me that it would be more
convenient if jset/ODBSet allowed the option to use json/javascript encoding for
boolean values; or at least had that as a format option for jset/ODBSet.  That
way my javascript could look like

var mybool = true;
URI_command =
"?cmd=jset&odb=/Equipment/DCRC/Common/Hidden&format=json-nokeys&value=" + mybool;

instead of

var mybool = true;
URI_command = ""
if(mybool){
  URI_command =
"?cmd=jset&odb=/Equipment/DCRC/Common/Hidden&format=json-nokeys&value=y";
else
  URI_command =
"?cmd=jset&odb=/Equipment/DCRC/Common/Hidden&format=json-nokeys&value=n";


__________________________________________________________
Cross-posting from bitbucket issue tracker:

https://bitbucket.org/tmidas/midas/issues/29/jset-odbset-using-true-false-for-booleans

See bitbucket for the solution.

https://bitbucket.org/tmidas/midas/issues/29/jset-odbset-using-true-false-for-booleans#comment-20550474

> MIDAS does not seem to be consistent (or at least convenient) with how it
> handles booleans in AJAX functions.

MIDAS documentation does not say that arguments to "jset" (ODBSet) should be JSON-encoded:
https://midas.triumf.ca/MidasWiki/index.php/AJAX#jset

You found undocumented behavior.

As solution, we plan to replace "jset/ODBSet" with a JSON-RPC function, where all parameters will be JSON-encoded 
(obviously).

K.O.


> 
> When you request an ODB value that is a boolean with AJAX call like
> 
> http://neut14.triumf.ca:8081/?cmd=jcopy&odb=/Equipment/DCRC/Common/Hidden&format=json-nokeys
> 
> then you get
> 
> { "Hidden/last_written" : 1437065425, "Hidden" : false }
> 
> This seems correct, since the JSON convention has booleans encoded as true/false.
> 
> But this convention does not work when trying to set the boolean value. For instance
> 
> http://neut14.triumf.ca:8081/?cmd=jset&odb=/Equipment/DCRC/Common/Hidden&format=json-nokeys&value=true
> 
> does not set the variable to true. To make this work you need to use the
> characters y/n
> 
> http://neut14.triumf.ca:8081/?cmd=jset&odb=/Equipment/DCRC/Common/Hidden&format=json-nokeys&value=y
> 
> I tested this with ajax/jset, but the same problem seems to occur when using the
> javascript function ODBSet. The documentation doesn't say what sort of encoding
> to use when using these functions, so I guess the idea is that these functions
> use MIDAS encoding for booleans. But it seems to me that it would be more
> convenient if jset/ODBSet allowed the option to use json/javascript encoding for
> boolean values; or at least had that as a format option for jset/ODBSet.  That
> way my javascript could look like
> 
> var mybool = true;
> URI_command =
> "?cmd=jset&odb=/Equipment/DCRC/Common/Hidden&format=json-nokeys&value=" + mybool;
> 
> instead of
> 
> var mybool = true;
> URI_command = ""
> if(mybool){
>   URI_command =
> "?cmd=jset&odb=/Equipment/DCRC/Common/Hidden&format=json-nokeys&value=y";
> else
>   URI_command =
> "?cmd=jset&odb=/Equipment/DCRC/Common/Hidden&format=json-nokeys&value=n";
> 
> 
> __________________________________________________________
> Cross-posting from bitbucket issue tracker:
> 
> https://bitbucket.org/tmidas/midas/issues/29/jset-odbset-using-true-false-for-booleans

> > MIDAS does not seem to be consistent (or at least convenient) with how it
> > handles booleans in AJAX functions.

The JSON-RPC functions have been merged into main midas and you can now use the new function mjsonrpc_db_paste(paths, values, id, 
callback, error_callback);

For example:

mjsonrpc_db_paste(["/foo","/bar","/baz"],[1,2,3]);

the target items should already exist (for this example, not in general).

All data is JSON encoded, success/failure is returned via callbacks.

K.O.

> > Could you give more info on your setup:
> > - CAMAC controller model
> Jorway 73A, we have three in hand and the problem doesn't depend on which controller
> we were using.

Dawei sent me a copy of his jorway73a.c scsi-camac driver. It is quite different from the
file in the MIDAS distribution. Dawei tells me that the file from the MIDAS distribution
does not compile. Stack traces from Dawei indicate a hang in this modified jorway73a.c
scsi-camac driver.

K.O.

> > > Could you give more info on your setup:
> > > - CAMAC controller model
> > Jorway 73A, we have three in hand and the problem doesn't depend on which controller
> > we were using.
> 
> Dawei sent me a copy of his jorway73a.c scsi-camac driver. It is quite different from the
> file in the MIDAS distribution. Dawei tells me that the file from the MIDAS distribution
> does not compile. Stack traces from Dawei indicate a hang in this modified jorway73a.c
> scsi-camac driver.
> 
> K.O.

I encountered too that the jorway73a.c cannot work for my SCM-301 CAMAC driver. The
"jorway73a.c" distributed with MIDAS seems to work with Jorway 73a reversion > 300. But my
module has the reversion number 203. :-( I hope you can paste the modified version here so
that I can try it if I have spare time.
Regards.

I just committed a MIDAS example for using most mhttpd html and javascript functions: ODBGet(), 
ODBSet(), ODBRpc() & co.

Please checkout .../midas/examples/javascript1, and follow instructions in the README file.

For your enjoyment, the example html file is attached to this message.

(to use the function ODBRpc_rev1 - the midas rpc call that returns data to the web page - you need 
mhttpd svn rev 4994 committed today. Other functions should work with any revision of mhttpd)

svn rev 4992.
K.O.

> JSON-RPC interface

For interfacing to MIDAS just from browser javascript, the user does not need to know anything about JSON-RPC, all the user-level mjsonrpc_xxx() functions provided by 
mhttpd.js work the same as the old ODBxxx() functions.

As usual, the functions are documented using Doxygen, so here there is no difference between old and new interfaces.

To generate the documentation, run "make dox" (doxygen and graphviz "dot" packages should be installed). (it will take some time to generate everything), then open 
html/index.html and navigate to "files" to "mhttpd.js" and you will see the list of all RPC funcrions (old functions are ODBxxx, new functions are mjsonrpc_xxx).

There was a possibility to implement the mjsonrpc javascript client interface as a javascript class, but older versions of doxygen seem to work incorrectly for such code making it 
impossible to document the code. So it remains implemented as traditional functions with a few globals, but the design an implementation are done with a view to convert the 
code to a javascript class some time in the future.

As ever, the examples/javascript1 experiment provides examples of using all available javascript functions supported by midas. (except for functions that are hard to example or 
hard to document).

K.O.

I am currently testing the new history system on the mhttpd side and stumbled over the following issue: typically our user open a lot of midas web-page tabs and keep them open. With the current version this leads after a night typically to a state where the browser is busy with itself and not reacting anymore.

One important reason seems to be that ALL tabs trying to communicate all the time which is totally unnecessary, since I think a hidden tab should stay in a sleeping mode. 

I was browsing if there is a way to find out if a tab is active or not, and found the following API which exactly does this:

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Page_Visibility_API

Furthermore, the simple

document.hidden 

tag, could be used to find out if the page is currently active.

Wouldn't it a good idea to send all midas tabs which are not active into a sleep mode and only reactivate them if they come into focus?

I had a quick look at the JavaScript libs of midas, but I am not quite certain where to best inject this.