Please make the output of the board listall --format json deterministic #1909
Description
Describe the request
During the review of arduino/arduino-ide#1520, I noticed that the output of board listall --format json is not always the same. It's not a big deal, but it works fine with the non json output. It would be great to have the same result when I execute the same command twice. This also affects the gRPC API.
Update:
For completeness, the order of the boards inside a platform matches the boards.txt order, but the platforms' order seems "random".
Describe the current behavior
I am using a CLI from c8ff042:
% ./arduino-cli version
arduino-cli Version: git-snapshot Commit: c8ff0425 Date: 2022-10-06T06:38:53Z
I have the following platforms installed:
% ./arduino-cli core list
ID Installed Latest Name
arduino:mbed_nano 3.2.0 3.3.0 Arduino Mbed OS Nano Boards
arduino:nrf52 1.0.2 1.0.2 Arduino nRF52 Boards
littleBits:avr 1.0.0 1.0.0 littleBits Arduino AVR Modules
When I run board listall without the --format json flags, I always get the same result:
% ./arduino-cli board listall
Board Name FQBN
Arduino Nano 33 BLE arduino:mbed_nano:nano33ble
Arduino Nano RP2040 Connect arduino:mbed_nano:nanorp2040connect
Arduino Primo arduino:nrf52:primo
Arduino Primo Core arduino:nrf52:primo_core
littleBits w6 Arduino Module (Leonardo) littleBits:avr:w6_arduino
% ./arduino-cli board listall
Board Name FQBN
Arduino Nano 33 BLE arduino:mbed_nano:nano33ble
Arduino Nano RP2040 Connect arduino:mbed_nano:nanorp2040connect
Arduino Primo arduino:nrf52:primo
Arduino Primo Core arduino:nrf52:primo_core
littleBits w6 Arduino Module (Leonardo) littleBits:avr:w6_arduino
% ./arduino-cli board listall
Board Name FQBN
Arduino Nano 33 BLE arduino:mbed_nano:nano33ble
Arduino Nano RP2040 Connect arduino:mbed_nano:nanorp2040connect
Arduino Primo arduino:nrf52:primo
Arduino Primo Core arduino:nrf52:primo_core
littleBits w6 Arduino Module (Leonardo) littleBits:avr:w6_arduino
% ./arduino-cli board listall
Board Name FQBN
Arduino Nano 33 BLE arduino:mbed_nano:nano33ble
Arduino Nano RP2040 Connect arduino:mbed_nano:nanorp2040connect
Arduino Primo arduino:nrf52:primo
Arduino Primo Core arduino:nrf52:primo_core
littleBits w6 Arduino Module (Leonardo) littleBits:avr:w6_arduino
% ./arduino-cli board listall
Board Name FQBN
Arduino Nano 33 BLE arduino:mbed_nano:nano33ble
Arduino Nano RP2040 Connect arduino:mbed_nano:nanorp2040connect
Arduino Primo arduino:nrf52:primo
Arduino Primo Core arduino:nrf52:primo_core
littleBits w6 Arduino Module (Leonardo) littleBits:avr:w6_arduino
Run the same command with the --format json flag at least twice (or multiple times), and you most likely get a different output than the previous one:
% ./arduino-cli board listall --format json
{
"boards": [
{
"name": "Arduino Primo",
"fqbn": "arduino:nrf52:primo",
"platform": {
"id": "arduino:nrf52",
"installed": "1.0.2",
"latest": "1.0.2",
"name": "Arduino nRF52 Boards",
"maintainer": "Arduino",
"website": "http://www.arduino.cc/",
"email": "packages@arduino.cc"
}
},
{
"name": "Arduino Primo Core",
"fqbn": "arduino:nrf52:primo_core",
"platform": {
"id": "arduino:nrf52",
"installed": "1.0.2",
"latest": "1.0.2",
"name": "Arduino nRF52 Boards",
"maintainer": "Arduino",
"website": "http://www.arduino.cc/",
"email": "packages@arduino.cc"
}
},
{
"name": "Arduino Nano RP2040 Connect",
"fqbn": "arduino:mbed_nano:nanorp2040connect",
"platform": {
"id": "arduino:mbed_nano",
"installed": "3.2.0",
"latest": "3.3.0",
"name": "Arduino Mbed OS Nano Boards",
"maintainer": "Arduino",
"website": "http://www.arduino.cc/",
"email": "packages@arduino.cc"
}
},
{
"name": "Arduino Nano 33 BLE",
"fqbn": "arduino:mbed_nano:nano33ble",
"platform": {
"id": "arduino:mbed_nano",
"installed": "3.2.0",
"latest": "3.3.0",
"name": "Arduino Mbed OS Nano Boards",
"maintainer": "Arduino",
"website": "http://www.arduino.cc/",
"email": "packages@arduino.cc"
}
},
{
"name": "littleBits w6 Arduino Module (Leonardo)",
"fqbn": "littleBits:avr:w6_arduino",
"platform": {
"id": "littleBits:avr",
"installed": "1.0.0",
"latest": "1.0.0",
"name": "littleBits Arduino AVR Modules",
"maintainer": "littleBits Electronics",
"website": "http://www.littlebits.cc/bits/w6-arduino",
"email": "support@littlebits.cc"
}
}
]
}
% ./arduino-cli board listall --format json
{
"boards": [
{
"name": "Arduino Nano RP2040 Connect",
"fqbn": "arduino:mbed_nano:nanorp2040connect",
"platform": {
"id": "arduino:mbed_nano",
"installed": "3.2.0",
"latest": "3.3.0",
"name": "Arduino Mbed OS Nano Boards",
"maintainer": "Arduino",
"website": "http://www.arduino.cc/",
"email": "packages@arduino.cc"
}
},
{
"name": "Arduino Nano 33 BLE",
"fqbn": "arduino:mbed_nano:nano33ble",
"platform": {
"id": "arduino:mbed_nano",
"installed": "3.2.0",
"latest": "3.3.0",
"name": "Arduino Mbed OS Nano Boards",
"maintainer": "Arduino",
"website": "http://www.arduino.cc/",
"email": "packages@arduino.cc"
}
},
{
"name": "Arduino Primo",
"fqbn": "arduino:nrf52:primo",
"platform": {
"id": "arduino:nrf52",
"installed": "1.0.2",
"latest": "1.0.2",
"name": "Arduino nRF52 Boards",
"maintainer": "Arduino",
"website": "http://www.arduino.cc/",
"email": "packages@arduino.cc"
}
},
{
"name": "Arduino Primo Core",
"fqbn": "arduino:nrf52:primo_core",
"platform": {
"id": "arduino:nrf52",
"installed": "1.0.2",
"latest": "1.0.2",
"name": "Arduino nRF52 Boards",
"maintainer": "Arduino",
"website": "http://www.arduino.cc/",
"email": "packages@arduino.cc"
}
},
{
"name": "littleBits w6 Arduino Module (Leonardo)",
"fqbn": "littleBits:avr:w6_arduino",
"platform": {
"id": "littleBits:avr",
"installed": "1.0.0",
"latest": "1.0.0",
"name": "littleBits Arduino AVR Modules",
"maintainer": "littleBits Electronics",
"website": "http://www.littlebits.cc/bits/w6-arduino",
"email": "support@littlebits.cc"
}
}
]
}
%
Arduino CLI version
Operating system
macOS
Operating system version
12.5.1
Additional context
No response
Issue checklist
- I searched for previous requests in the issue tracker
- I verified the feature was still missing when using the nightly build
- My request contains all necessary details