Oh I wouldn't say that - you've introduced organization and self-documentation and successfully addressed a problem
But does that solution keep the IDE in track, is my question. Right now, the IDE intermittently cannot seem to support having two distinct board/port/sketch instances open concurrently; that has nothing to do with my getting confused at all - though that happens in lots of other areas
No, the IDE intermittently insists on applying board and port information from one window (one instance, in my mind - because I can clearly see two of everything, including window frames, menus, buttons, etc., they are clearly separate) - to another. Sometimes when I bring up two windows it will keep them separate, sometimes it doesn't; I haven't yet discovered what I do - if it is anything of my doing at all - to make the IDE work properly.
To add a familiar use case by way of comparison: if I had two Word documents open in two windows, I wouldn't expect a change in font size in one window to take effect in the other; if I had two Powerpoint presentations open, I wouldn't expect a change in the default text color to take effect in the other. They are, in each case, completely separate documents. Why, then, would I consider that having two separate sketches, open concurrently, be forcibly compiled for the same board type, and ported via the same port? I can see no possible rationale for that.
I think I can be confident in calling this a bug, not a feature
julianop:
Coding Badly, I think we may have a semantic disconnect here, so I'll try and re-word my problem.
What we have is you failing to follow basic instructions...
Run the IDE as many times as you need using whatever mechanism is typical for your operating system (e.g. double-click the Arduino IDE icon). Load one sketch in each instance.
julianop:
But does that solution keep the IDE in track, is my question.
There is no need to use the IDE. You could just as well use two instances of PuTTY to monitor the output.
I frequently do use the IDE Serial Monitor - though I can't remember when I last tried to monitor two Arduinos with it at the same time. Recently I have been using Minicom - but that may only work on Linux.
What we have, Coding Badly, is you being unnecessarily curt, bordering on rude.
What is it in what I have described that is not exactly what you have said?
"Run the IDE as many times as you need using whatever mechanism is typical for your operating system (e.g. double-click the Arduino IDE icon). Load one sketch in each instance..
Robin2, it's not primarily about monitoring, though that is certainly a factor. And I DO use PuTTY as a monitor, partly to circumvent this problem and partly to use VT100 codes.
Here's what happens, again.
I open window 1, Mega2560, USB port 6, let's say. I then open window 2, Pro Mini, port 7, let's say.
I do a few edits to window 1, make, and upload/run.
Leaving that window open, I make some edits in window 2, and upload/run.
The boards are talking to each other via I2C, by the way, which is why I want two windows open concurrently in the first place.
Leaving window 2 open, I go back to window 1, only to find that it now shows the Pro Mini and port 7, although it still has sketch 1 in the editor.
I correct that, go back to window 2 - the Pro Mini, leaving window 1 open - and now it shows Mega 2560 and Port 6 with sketch 2.
Just out of curiosity I have just opened an instance of the IDE (1.5.6) with the blank program in it and set the board to Mega and the port to ttyS0 (I have no Arduinos connected).
Then I opened a second instance and set the board to Uno and the port to ttyS1. When I switch from one instance to the other they each retain their settings.
And just to be clear (because this is what may be causing confusion) I started two completely separate instances of the IDE from the operating system. I did NOT create a second "window" from the first instance.
Robin2:
And just to be clear (because this is what may be causing confusion) I started two completely separate instances of the IDE from the operating system. I did NOT create a second "window" from the first instance.
...R
Aha, yes, that would indeed be the problem. Opening a second window is not the same as opening the IDE a second time from the launch mechanism. I see no clear way I could have known that, however; there is no clear way of knowing that that is what one is doing, and there is no way of distinguishing between different instances once windows are open, other than the trap I fell into. Opening a sketch from the recent menu gives no indication that the new windows is tied to the one from which it was opened. I have three windows open at this moment, one opened from the other, and the third from the launcher icon, and there is no way I can identify that two of them are somehow linked.
I can see what Coding Badly was trying to tell me, but it only makes "sense" (lexically, that is: the behavioral difference is completely nonsensical to me) now I know there is a difference. I don't know how I could have known that beforehand. It is certainly not consistent with the standard practices deployed in windowing operating systems I've used over the past thirty plus years.
I have verified on Windows 10 that if I start two separate instances of the IDE, changing the PORT number on one will cause the other's PORT number to change also. One is on PORT 31, the other is on PORT 21 (one is a LoRa Sender, the other is a LoRa Receiver, so I see in the title bar). This is just plain NUTS! The only conclusion I can draw is that these are NOT two separate instances, but are sharing some underlying information. I've used the same technique to open the second instance as I use to open multiple instances of Windows explorer - I right click the icon in the taskbar and then select the application name. It works for every other application I've tried on my computer, except the Arduino IDE.
I'm running Arduino.CC IDE version 1.8.5 which I believe is the latest.
I right-click the arduino icon in my taskbar, then left-click the arduino icon immediately above the "Unpin from taskbar" line. Doing this with any other application on my system brings up a totally separate copy of the application.
I sometimes operate a variety of different Arduino boards at the same time. These include standard Arduino, SparkFun, Adafruit, Teensy, and MiniCore.
I also observed that opening additional Arduino IDE windows permits several different sketches to be edited simultaneously, but there is only one active "boards" setting at any given time.
I will experiment with starting multiple instances of the Arduino IDE with the goal of simultaneous operation of completely different types of boards.
@electricboyo, I noticed in another Thread that you are thinking of using Notepad++ as an external editor. You may be interested in the links in my Reply #1 in this Thread. I see no reason why you could not use my Python program with any editor.