Which PicBasic Software To Use?

[p.erasmus]

Chris

I will advise you to install the package manager from the link,it is a free tool to install the additional application specific libraries such as TCP/IP ,USB Device and Host applications, FAT32 Filesystem library and many more , these additional Libraries are found on LibStock web site ,There are so many and we decide with mE some time ago to allow the user to install what he needs because if you install everything the IDE is to huge this the birth of Libstock and Package Manager

http://www.mikroe.com/package-manager/

LibStock

http://www.libstock.com/

Libstock is a place were mikroE release application Libraries and users share applications it has a huge stock of code and example which range from blinking Leds to Running High speed Motors in SVM mode (complex stuff)

There are also additional Plug inTools for the compiler that you can down load from Libstock a useful one is the Timer Calculator too see below ,

http://www.libstock.com/projects/view/398/timer-calculator

Tool for calculating CAN Baudrates and setups

http://www.libstock.com/project_categories/view/15/can-lin-rs485

Keep in mind that the library manager shows only the libraries available for the device selected in the Project vwindow
.for example if you use a small PIC16 then you might not have all the Libraies available in the Library window because the device does not support all the functions I would advise to select a PIC18F45K22 or so to see what is available as Libraries because it is a higer level device.

There are string functions see my screen print (its under string Library)

The tool also supports a large number of TFT and GLCD drivers directly from the libraries or from a graphical Display designer (this is not a free tool however very usefull)

TFT displays
http://www.mikroe.com/visualtft/

GLCD Dsipalys

http://www.mikroe.com/visualglcd/

There are also a free Font creator for GLCD displays

http://www.mikroe.com/glcd-font-creator/

Aslo keep in mind that you can mix assembly and Basic in one file ,this if you would like to optimize code fuctions you can write them in assembly just use the asm specifier see the manul you could also do the asm codeing
in a separate module and call the functions from this module see manual sections modules.

The Compiler use the exact syntax as Microchip Datasheet meaning ADCON in the datasheet is ADCON in the Compiler ,TON in the datasheet is TON in the compiler more the same syntax you can not get and all other syntax as
If()elseIf if ,do while ect are all standard Basic syntax in VB,VB.Net and in mikroBasic I am not sure what you mean by the syntax are not Microchip syntax.


Just another note the OLD PICBASIC from ME Labs are not a professional tool and they do a lot of funny function that a professional user will never use ,the mikroE tool conforms to the BASIC standards ,

I hope this give you a bit of Info into a large world of the mikroE Tools

 

[richardb]

@ p.erasmus

"There are so many and we decide "

are you connected to mikroE ?

 

[p.erasmus]

No I am not connected to mE ,I just use the tools professionally for my bread and butter
everyday since 8 years

This was asked by the users on the mE Forum the reason I say "we" because it was a User initiative !!

 

[p.erasmus]

maybe have a look, it's hard to argue with free.

This is no option for any professional as it ties you down to a specific hardware and what it supports.Even as a hobbiest I would like to have freedom on design and what I can program

 

[p.erasmus]

Just to take the discussion to the next level

As you might know the new PIC16F1xxx series have cpu independant peripherals such as the
Configurable Logic cell(CLC) Complementary waveform generator(CWG) Numeric Controlled Oscillator(NCO) and more which runs cpu independant which can generate very complex waveforms and logic combinations
there are configuration tools available from MCHP to configure these complex modules graphically to beable to see what you are doing these tools runs as plugin in the mE IDE you simply configure the module generate the code and use it in the mikroE IDE/ compiler the same for the complex PWM generator.

when I add all these features from the mikroE then I ask myself the question for cost of the mE compiler does the free tool really make sense that limits me to a specific hardware and what it supports??

 

[richardb]

No I am not connected to mE ,I just use the tools professionally for my bread and butter
everyday since 8 years

You said at the beginning that you used the c compiler for daily use. is it fair to give opinions on the basic compiler?

This is no option for any professional as it ties you down to a specific hardware and what it supports.

Is Chris a professional or hobbiest? i don't know for sure but cost always matters for a hobbiest.

Even as a hobbiest I would like to have freedom on design and what I can program

If you had visted the website you would see that its actually very open. the schematics and code are all there the only thing is that they only oficially support 2 specific pic types but they seem helpfull on other devices, it is very new though.

 

[p.erasmus]

You said at the beginning that you used the c compiler for daily use. is it fair to give opinions on the basic compiler?

It seems that you want to go into an argument which I have no interst in ,however none of the above info or comments I gave on the Basic compiler is inaccurate or false or insultaing anybody.I do think that my knowledge of the Basic compiler/Tools are as good as my knowledge on the C compilers .
If there is any of the info you find inaccurate or misleading towards the mE compilers then please point it out.

I do not see that I mention Chris in the reply you mentioned , I mentioned things in my personal opinion regarding cost and so on not pointing to anybody or any vendor .

with this said this topic is closed for me .

 

[richardb]

It seems that you want to go into an argument which I have no interst in ,however none of the above info or comments I gave on the Basic compiler is inaccurate or false or insultaing anybody.I do think that my knowledge of the Basic compiler/Tools are as good as my knowledge on the C compilers .

I didnt mean to offend i just thought it was a fair question.

with this said this topic is closed for me .

Well i'm sorry you feel that way and i apologise to Chris. for causing this problem.
I hope you will still answer any questions that Chris may have.
R

 

[CDRIVE]

I had some more mikroe questions but I didn't want to pollute your thread..

https://www.electronicspoint.com/mikrobasic-pic-questions-t266460.html#post1593678


Rich

No problem. You could have put it here, as it's totally pertinent to this thread.
The more I learn about MBP the better.

Chris

 

[CDRIVE]

Is Chris a professional or hobbiest? i don't know for sure but cost always matters for a hobbiest.

My background is included in my profile. Just click on my avatar. ..Retired engineering tech. I like toys and I don't like being limited by restrictions found in free editions. If I like something I'm a extremely compulsive shopper. That is unless the cost is in the ozone. My ceiling on software is > $300.00. When it approaches this number I procrastinate. The $200.00 region is instant buy. Retirement for me doesn't translate to mentally vegetating. I must feed my brain, even if it costs money to do it.

with this said this topic is closed for me .

What in the world just happened here? This is not how we behave here at EP. We are not a bunch of uptight ( you hurt my feelings) sensitive girls. Yes, it's a sexist statement but I'm old and I claim seniority to say politically and socially incorrect things. That's me in my avatar. Not my grandfather.

Sometimes things come across in print that was never intended to be insulting or demeaning, or even challenging. It just seems that way. I didn't read anything in Richard's posts that hinted at either though.

Peter, you may be new here but you're not an electronics or programming nube. Your opinions and input are valuable to me and anyone else that's enlightened by your knowledge. You're probably the only member that knows MBP at all! For me, you're a goldmine because you have extensive experience with it.

I will not beg you but I will ask you to please reconsider bailing out. If not for Richard's sake, then for mine.

Chris

 

[p.erasmus]

I didnt mean to offend i just thought it was a fair question.

@Richard

I understand it this way ,Thank you

@Chris

I am not bailing out ,happy to help where I can

 

[CDRIVE]

@Richard

I understand it this way ,Thank you

@Chris

I am not bailing out ,happy to help where I can

Thanks Peter, you'll find that even the mods here at EP are very human. Even they occasionally misinterpret the tone of a post and respond in like manner. It's probably the thing I like about EP the most. I feel connected to the membership, mods and administration like no other forum I've been active in. I guess you could say that ElectronicsPoint is HID compliant!

I probably won't get a reply from MB till Monday but that hasn't stopped me from playing with it on the XP machine. I'll have questions for you, I'm sure but I want to be able to ask the questions with a modicum of intelligence before I do. So I'll keep playing in the sandbox for now.

Thanks,
Chris

 

[richardb]

how did you get on with mikroe basic chris?
have you tried programming anything yet ?

 

[CDRIVE]

how did you get on with mikroe basic chris?
have you tried programming anything yet ?

Ha, that requires a digressive answer. Writing programs with it? Not quite. Playing with it and modifying existing examples.. yes.

This may put you to sleep but here's the whole extremely complicated and convoluted picture, sequenced in the order of events. However, even this is condensed!

You already know about my multiple downloads, installs and errors. You also know that I installed MBP on my old XP machine successfully. So I'll start with the XP machine first. Everything was working fine. Chris was having fun exploring the MBP IDE and all its folders. Then Microsoft alerts me of important updates. So despite my promise to never again yuck up a (once smooth running) PC with Microsoft updates,.. I did. I then spent the next three days trying to undo the update or kill a rogue instance of SvcHost.exe. It sucks 100% of my CPU cycles! Until I cure this I've resigned myself to manually killing the process in the Task Manager. Once killed it thankfully remains asleep until I reboot. Admittedly, I did play with MBP in-between messing with this issue.

OK, moving on to MBP on my W7 laptop...

After receiving my last reply from the MB help desk I followed their download and installation instructions to the letter. The window chopping was a minor fix and that issue is resolved. However, I'm still getting error messages unless I run it as administrator. The error messages seem to be generated by MBP, not windows. Let's put it this way.. If these error messages are generated by and sent to MS I'm going to get tanked trying to forget the wasted time trying to send them. These errors are interactive and include options to view the complete error package that's going to be sent. The attached image shows the tabbed error report and another error (on the right) is generated when closing MBP. The instances of the error reports total 3. Two when starting, followed by the "File not accessible" message that's generated when I close MBP. This is followed by another error report window.

I suspect that the MB support instructions were not quite accurate. I was told to install MBP by running the installer as Administrator. I believe that this might be insufficient and what's really required to Logon As Administrator to run the installer.

At this point I'm going to stop here just to make sure that you're still awake. I think I'm getting weary trying to recall all the chain of events. I'll continue the saga when I get back from my watering hole.

In chapter 2 Chris gets further diverted when trying to install an email client to send the aforementioned error reports. Which includes an exiting revisit with DOS prompts and batch files.

Chris

 

[CDRIVE]

Forget what I said about continuing with this odyssey. I changed the permissions in MBP's properties to "Run As Administrator". Now I can left click on it and only deal with the "Do you want to run this file?" windows prompt. I can live with that for now. I want to spend my time familiarizing myself with the library and writing some basic code

For those that are currently reading this thread and for anyone who stumbles across it in the future.... Don't be dissuaded by my installation issues. It's not the software that's the problem. W7 has much higher security than XP and earlier. It's this alone that made my road bumpy. There's nothing wrong with the MikroBasic software. In fact, I love it! The library was designed and structured by geniuses!

Chris

 

[p.erasmus]

Chris
Happy to hear you are up and running good luck

 

[richardb]

It's funny I seem to have had almost the exact opposite experience of using MBP.

I've installed it on 2 windows 7 computers

Windows 7 pro 64bit worked fine leaving it to install in the default location. although I haven't used it a lot maybe I've not had permission issues as it may not have tried to save anything.


The second computer was windows 7 pro32bit on this machine I installed it to c:\mikrobasic\... this also worked fine and I have done a little work with it.

I really wanted to like It as I have a real need for a pic32 compiler, but at the moment I don't like it at all but maybe that will change.

I'll expand on this later when I have a better feel for what it can and cant do .

Richard

 

[CDRIVE]

It's funny I seem to have had almost the exact opposite experience of using MBP.

I've installed it on 2 windows 7 computers

Windows 7 pro 64bit worked fine leaving it to install in the default location. although I haven't used it a lot maybe I've not had permission issues as it may not have tried to save anything.


I really wanted to like It as I have a real need for a pic32 compiler, but at the moment I don't like it at all but maybe that will change.

I'll expand on this later when I have a better feel for what it can and cant do .

Richard

Were you "Logged On" as Administrator when you installed them? I don't have to save anything to throw these errors. Two of them are generated immediately when running it. As I said though, all is well if I run it as administrator. There were no errors or untypical windows messages, warnings during installation though.

As far as not liking it, I can't imagine that, but I'm anxious to here why.

Chris

 

[richardb]

my logon is setup as an administrator. no I didn't right click to run as administrator.

its difficult to type right now as I have a 1year old asleep on me.

 

[richardb]

The mikroBasic PRO for PIC compiler provides a bit data type that may be used for variable declarations. It can not be used for argument lists, and function-return values.

this seems odd and annoying
also it doesn't support Boolean types atall

i'd miss that alone for program clarity

so in sf you can do

dim dooropen as portb.Booleans(4)

then test for it

while dooropen //<or this could be a function that returns a boolean
 do stuff
wend

obviously this is mostly a cosmetic thing but I will miss it
i'll try to post some more when the boy wakes up

rich