ViperIDE: .mpy disassembler

[vshymanskyy]

Working on .mpy disassembler in ViperIDE.
Cutting-edge or cringe? Tell me! 😅
Would it be useful?

[GitHubsSilverBullet]

Cutting-edge or cringe? Tell me!

IMNSHO: Definitely cringe.
Those who create a mpy file have the original. So there's no point except – let's just called it what it is – for those who want to steal. Just .02

[ned-pcs]

There are already tools that allow disassembly of .mpy files.
One obvious example is mpy-tool in the MicroPython /tools directory.

[vshymanskyy]

Which is exactly what is running here, it's mpy-tool. No plans to do anything beyond that

[GitHubsSilverBullet]

@vshymanskyy You asked for an opinion. You've got one now.
All you have to provide in response are snide remarks.
Maybe you'd like to think about why a GUI tool is like an open invitation while a command line tool is not.
Plonk!

[vshymanskyy]

Sorry, an open invitation to do what exactly? To explore your binary packages? To educate yourself?

[vshymanskyy]

I'm wondering if this could be useful for advanced developers or at least for educational purposes?
Maybe it could drive some interest in MPY internals

[vshymanskyy]

My impression is that other features would be more desirable first

@rkompass what do you have on your mind?
(except being able to sync the device FS with a local folder or GitHub)

[rkompass]

A few more file operations:

• Renaming of files/folders, perhaps as option of the delete confirming pop-up dialog.
• Not exactly syncing, but almost: Now that creating a folder with '+' works, how about creating/importing a folder with the same '+', using a button at the pop-up dialog for the filename which allows to select a folder from the local file system?

A way to display graphics:
Often MP is used to easily gain access to measurement data. It would be beneficial to have the ability to channel a data stream (from an ADC perhaps) to some simple yet nice form of graphics displayed 'online'.
The Arduino IDE has such an ability but it is very restricted and not nice. Still it is useful sometimes. Would be nice to have something like this or better for MP.

Perhaps a way to display contents of a framebuffer device, which would help a lot in developing/testing framebuffer applications.

In connection with a simple hardware description file of the device (which would tell about the pin layout) a real-time display of the state of the pins could be done with different colors for the input or output setting of the pins, different levels at them and perhaps even the usage of certain pins for IO like I2C or PCI.

An option to run the REPL asynchronously, perhaps together with the asyncio profiler by @andrewleech.

A way to serve the IDE from the chip running MP itself.

I problably can think of a lot more. Like a display of file system usage, memory usage and fragmentation, variable inspection. Which probably are much more complicated and require additions to the MP interpreter side like those Thonny is using. Not nice, probably. So don't feel pressured by any of this.:-)

[dhalbert]

Potential feature: shadow backup version of files saved to the board. This allows direct editing of files on the board for a quick development cycle, and also easy recovery if the on-board filesystem becomes corrupted or erased.

As this is a web-based editor, it may be a bit of a user nuisance to give the permissions to access the backup location.

[vshymanskyy]

@rkompass that's some really nice ideas. Thank you!
I've been considering some of these already. These are of particular interest:

• asyncio repl
• file/folder upload and rename
• some form of data streaming/chart display

Some notes on other ideas:

framebuffer device

no idea if this is feasible to implement on the IDE level, esp. considering that all data is pumped through a UART

a real-time display of the state of the pins could be done with different colors

sounds like a completely separate project

A way to serve the IDE from the chip running MP itself.

The minimal version pf ViperIDE is rather small (~2 Mb), however with all the cool features (like Ruff linter) it approaches 10 Mb.
It's not feasible to host on the device. Also, why? ViperIDE happily works (and opens) even if your PC is offline.

[rkompass]

O.k., I see.
Totally agree with your selection/preference of these 3 items.

ViperIDE happily works (and opens) even if your PC is offline.

Didn't know that.

What else came to mind:
Perhaps offer a way to use the tools mpy-cross or even mpremote?
This might help transform .py files to .mpy (with mpy-cross) to save space and execution time+memory.

Also if one would be able to mount a directory from the PC (with mpremote), that would be awesome.

Could that be possible in principle or is it not, because you cannot run programs from the PC side?

framebuffer device

no idea if this is feasible to implement on the IDE level, esp. considering that all data is pumped through a UART

perhaps it is possible using MP for Webassembly in some future time. It is not important now anyway.
Also it might be that LVGL will take over in the future.

[vshymanskyy]

The MPY disassembler can now be enabled in the latest ViperIDE v0.4.13.
It works in a very curious way