I am not sure this is the correct answer. I am pulling data from an Arduino and it was only until I understood that the serial data is moving one character at a time that I was able to produce the code at both ends of the transaction process. Maybe the same principals apply for sending to the Arduino. The scheme I am using codes the data in character packets (strings actually) ending in line feeds and beginning in a letter code that designates the information type while separating the information (numbers in this case) with a space character, including the info. type character. The receiving code buffers the serial input according to the linefeed before digesting the data (splitting on the spaces into an array) where that first array element, the info type character, is used to determine what to do with the transmitted information.