An array inPort would make sense if several components were connected to the same component and data processing would be somehow different depending on array index. It seems to me that what you are trying to do is just sending a sequence of strings to be processed independently. In this case it's just

Sender NAME -> TASKS Receiver

where Sender emits one name and Receiver processes one task per invocation.

An addressable port makes sense here if Sender emits several names per invocation and those are combined per Receiver invocation, e.g. Receiver uses TASKS[0], [1], [2] and [3] to produce a single output packet.

As for WirePattern, it doesn't have any specific support for addressable ports, i.e. it deals with ports regardless of array index.

Thanks for the insight. I actually want to perform an operation on the array as a whole.

A contrived example would be something like this:

Take multiple NAMEs (each from different processes) and pass them all to the TASKS port as an array, where internally that component would count the number of tasks in the list.

So, it actually looks like:

Sender0 NAME -> TASKS[0] Receiver
Sender1 NAME -> TASKS[1] Receiver

Is it important that all 0...N names should arrive at TASKS port for Receiver to do something with the array?

@paulyoung This may be a starting point for that requirement: http://noflojs.org/component/noflo-adapters-PacketsToArray/

I cannot say whether PacketsToArray is up-to-date with the latest changes, but its worth the look.

@hayesmg PacketsToArray cannot be used here because data is coming from several senders, each sending a disconnect after a data packet.

I see what you're saying @trustmaster. The connect/send/disconnect of upstream ports invalidates the use of that component.

Is it important that all 0...N names should arrive at TASKS port for Receiver to do something with the array?

@trustmaster yes, that's correct.

@paulyoung then either an addressable port is needed here (which is not settled in WirePattern yet, see #240), or a Merge component that would merge packets arriving at inputs 0...N to a single output port as a sequence of N data packets followed by a disconnect, then PacketsToArray can be chained after such a Merge node.

An addressable port would be preferred over an intermediate component since that provides an nicer API.

I may be getting confused with the history of NoFlo. Is the old way to use ArrayPort and the current way to set addressable: true?

@paulyoung yep, ArrayPort is the old port API and addressable is the new, post-0.5 port API. It is still an "array port" in FBP terminology, though