Page 53 - Making PIC Microcontroller Instruments and Controllers

COMP|IENS,
42 THE SOFTWABE.IHE AND THE EOIIOF

with no limit on the number oilines of code you can wrile. It is fully inlegrated with
the software and hardware Fovided by microEngineering Labs and is the editor of
choice for mosl uscrs. (The free vclsion is limiled to compiling Fograms forjust a few
microcontrollers. bul these include both the -16F877A ^nd the 16F814)
Three ofthe editors available are:

: Midocode Studio Mecanique's Microcode Studio is a powedul, visual, inte
grated development environment (IDE) with an ln-Circuil Debugging (ICD) capa-
Labs'PICBASIC PRO Compiler
bility designed specifically lor microEngineering
This software can be dow oaded from the Inlemet at no chafgc. The only limilation
on the softwde is thal it allows you to run only one IDE at one time- This is not a
realhandicap at our lcvel of interesl, howevet since it is the editor that best suils our
needs, and because all programs in lhis book were writtcn with this edjtor
r Pmton+ Lite BASIC editor (provided by Crownhill) This is a tesl version oftheir
editor and is limited to 50 lincs of code and three processors (including the PIC
16F877A).Ilyou like this editot you can use this as your nain editor dnd then cut and
paste to the Microcode Studio to compile and run your programs' and thus go around
the soljine limil. The ndr ive ldnguage of this editot ir t?ot t e r.,ne ds PICBASI C, so
there are other handicaps to contend with- (These incompatibilities are best avoided-)
r Miqochip MPLAB This is the sotlware that the makef of the microcontrollers'
Microchip Technology Inc., provides fbr cditing programs written for their PIC serics
of microcontrollers. is an assembly levcl programmer We will not be doing any
It
assembly language progra ming, b l the editot can be usciul.

PICBASIC Compiler
PRO

The PICBASIC PRO Compiler-hereaftcr referred to as the PBP provides all the
functions needed to program almost the entire family of PIC microconuollers in a
BASIC-like environment. This means ii allows you to wite ptograms that read the
inputs and write to the outputs ina simple andeasy to-learn fashion lt means thatcom-
munications are simplified and that the time ii takes to get aII application running is
reduceal manyfold. lt also means that the programs are easier 10 follow and debug
(though debugging can get quile complicated even on these seemingly simple deviccs).
The compiler suppots only integer math, but that is not a big handicap when we are
working with these limited microprocessols
It also means that the programs that are developed are shorter than assembly language
programs, but they are slower in their execution than assembly language programs
(Complications also existthat have to do with the use of inteflupts, and which must be
addressed, but these are beyond the scope of this book )
All the exercises and examples provjded in the text are based on the PBPcompiler'
We will,rdt go over the detailed instructions for using each ofthe PBP instructions in
the text. It is expected and will be assumed that you will have purchased the soitware