Free junebug to good home

[3v0]

No thank you, I've already given it away.

I am rather sad to see you give up so easily. It was only a day between where for first tired to use Swordfish Basic to comiple an ASM program and giving up.

3v0

 

[Mike_2545]

Like I said in earlier posts, I felt there was too steep of a learning curve, with few guideposts along the way. I could not sit at the keyboard and blindly try different things, hoping to get it right. Maybe some day I'll reconcider and try again, but right now I have too many other projects demanding my time. I would have hoped for more guidence from the company that puts these out. No book recomendations, just some obscure reference to something somewhere in some software, that I may or may not have already downloaded.

You should be honest with people when suggesting the PIC.
1) What programs you will need to operate the chip. For the Junebug at least 3
2) What resources are available for you to find the information. Still no answer on books.
3) What background in computer science you will need

 

[be80be]

you could of used pic basic pro and it would all most be like programing a stamp

 

[Mike_2545]

you could of used pic basic pro and it would all most be like programing a stamp

I looked at that site. Very pricey. But of course I enjoy throwing money away. I bought the Junebug!!!

 

[be80be]

Mike if you had read my post tell me what this looks like
PicBasic Pro Compiler Manual

 ADCIN
  ASM..ENDASM
  BRANCH
  BRANCHL
  BUTTON
  CALL
  CLEAR
  CLEARWDT
  COUNT
  DATA	
  DEBUG
  DEBUGIN
  DISABLE
  DISABLE DEBUG
  DISABLE INTERRUPT
  DTMFOUT
  EEPROM
  ENABLE
  ENABLE DEBUG
  ERASECODE
  ENABLE INTERRUPT
  END
  FOR..NEXT
  FREQOUT
  GOSUB
  GOTO
  HIGH
  HPWM
  HSERIN
  HSEROUT
  I2CREAD
  I2CWRITE
  IF..THEN
  INPUT
  LCDIN
  LCDOUT
  {LET}
  LOOKDOWN
  LOOKDOWN2
  LOOKUP
  LOOKUP2
  LOW
  NAP
  ON DEBUG
  ON INTERRUPT
  OUTPUT
  OWIN
  OWOUT
  PAUSE
  PAUSEUS
  PEEK
  PEEKCODE
  POKE
  POKECODE
  POT
  PULSIN
  PULSOUT
  PWM
  RANDOM
  RCTIME
  READ
  READCODE
  RESUME
  RETURN
  REVERSE
  SELECT CASE
  SERIN
  SERIN2
  SEROUT
  SEROUT2
  SHIFTIN
  SHIFTOUT
  SLEEP
  SOUND
  STOP
  SWAP
  TOGGLE
  USBIN
  USBINIT
  USBOUT
  WHILE..WEND
  WRITE
  WRITECODE
  XIN
  XOUT	

6.  Structure of a Compiled Program
  6.1.  Target Specific Headers
  6.2.  The Library Files
  6.3.  PBP Generated Code
  6.4.  .ASM File Structure	

7.  Other PICBASIC PRO™ Considerations
  7.1.  How Fast is Fast Enough?
  7.2.  Configuration Settings
  7.3.  RAM Usage
  7.4.  Reserved Words
  7.5.  Life After 2K
  7.6.  12-bit core considerations

8.  Assembly Language Programming
  8.1.  Two Assemblers - No Waiting
  8.2.  Programming in Assembly Language
  8.3.  Placement of In-line Assembly
  8.4.  Another Assembly Issue

9.  Interrupts
  9.1.  Interrupts in General
  9.2.  Interrupts in BASIC
  9.3.  Interrupts in Assembler

10.  PICBASIC PRO™ / PicBasic /
 Stamp Differences
  10.1.  Execution Speed
  10.2.  Digital I/O
  10.3.  Low Power Instructions
  10.4.  Missing PC Interface
  10.5.  No Automatic Variables
  10.6.  No Nibble Variable Types
  10.7   No Dirs
  10.8   No Automatic Zeroing of Variables
  10.9.  Math Operators
  10.10.  [ ] Versus ( )
  10.11.  ABS
  10.12.  DATA, EEPROM, READ and WRITE
  10.13.  DEBUG
  10.14.  FOR..NEXT
  10.15.  GOSUB and RETURN
  10.16.  I2CREAD and I2CWRITE
  10.17.  IF..THEN
  10.18.  MAX and MIN
  10.19.  SERIN and SEROUT
  10.20.  SLEEP

if you read the picbasic pro book you be using swordfish easy in a week.

 

[be80be]

Your can use it for free

 

[Mike_2545]

Yeah, that looks like basic to me.

 

[3v0]

I do not speak for Blueroomelectronics.

We may have too many cooks stiring the pot just now. There is no clear cut direction.

People with your level of experiance have learned to program using the Junebug with the help of other forum members. Real programming is best done in the company of others. Esp if the others are more experianced. Sitting down with a book often leads to frustration.

We do not often talk about how long it takes to learn to program. For most people this is not a problem because once they get started it is fun and the time is not a problem.

3v0

 

[UTMonkey]

Hi Mike,

I too am sorry to see that you have slung your JuneBug, I have seen your previous posts about the difficulties you had but didnt comment because I am an utter novice in uC's, I think you were wanting to do something using serial comms - I am still roughly at the LED flashing stage (well nearly).

What I would say though is that the philosophy behind the Junebug and others like it is absolutely brilliant. Why have just a programmer when you can buy a programmer with some useful modules that assist the learning process!

I also found the information on the blueroom website easy to understand and the "local" knowledge on this site invaluable (just take a look at my earlier - more embarassing posts to do with the Junebug!).

A bit late to say this all I know, as you have got rid of the Junebug, but I am sure it will give whoever you gave it to hours and hours of fun!

All the best

Mark

 

[Mike_2545]

I do not speak for Blueroomelectronics.

We may have too many cooks stiring the pot just now. There is no clear cut direction.

People with your level of experiance have learned to program using the Junebug with the help of other forum members. Real programming is best done in the company of others. Esp if the others are more experianced. Sitting down with a book often leads to frustration.

We do not often talk about how long it takes to learn to program. For most people this is not a problem because once they get started it is fun and the time is not a problem.

3v0

This is true, I guess I was expecting more guidence or at least suggested reading material that was more for the first timer. (Books)
This lead to frustration and I made the disision to chuck the whole thing. At least I didn't put it in the trash, I offered it to someone that can use it.
I may pick up the PIC at some point down the road, but right now, with the projects on my plate, I can get them done with the Stamp.
Be80 was the first one to recommend a book "picbasic pro book", us old schoolers do better with printed material that text on the screen. I might pick up the book first and see what I think after that.

 

[be80be]

Man I started with a stamp and i thought all basic is the same till I couldn't find. My good old debug, pwm ,PULSIN Measure pulse width on a pin., PULSOUT Generate pulse to a pin. then I read how parallax stamp got started and all of them instruction are just modules made so you can use just use the one call in your code. And what got me was the guy that made them most was using a Pic and pic are cheaper then a stamp. If you want to see his code. Find where I found it and post it

 

[blueroomelectronics]

I'm sorry to hear you gave up on the kit. I also forgot about PICBASIC as it's Stamp compatible.
Historically BASIC has gotten a bad rap by programmers as it wasn't a structured language (ie goto) and was not really modular. Picbasic is old school basic like your C64 whereas Swordfish is a modular and structured basic (no gotos) you can build functions and modules (ie USB, FAT32, UART)
I suppose the while wend loop looks strange to anyone who is used to goto but proper programming disiplines will make it much easier to move onto other languages like C. It also makes your code easier to follow.
If you change your mind an want another Junebug contact me and I'll sell you one directly at cost + shipping.
In JPUG #2 Eric Gibbs wrote a Junbug simulator for the Oshonsoft simulator (30 runs trial)
IMO if you gave it a week I think you would have gotten the hang of it and would shelve you BS2 (yes I have a couple plus a BoeBot)

 

[be80be]

Bill you hit it on the head

I suppose the while wend loop looks strange to anyone who is used to goto but proper programming disiplines will make it much easier to move onto other languages like C. It also makes your code easier to follow.

I would of never seen it if I had not read the picbasic manual. Swordfish is powerful structured language. You have to write some code with it. But I love it now

 

[blueroomelectronics]

The do until & while wend looked strange to me too. Same with "while true" or "while 1" it's very C like. The interrupt stuff is often daunting as most beginners forget to check and or clear the IF bit. It's a really nice IDE and make sure you get the Consolas font for it.
Only complaint is I could never get the MPLAB integration working with the SE version. I've ordered the full version as I'd like to play with USB.

 

[3v0]

Let us harp

Given a progam template to setup the processor fuses and includes most anyone that can program, will be able to program at the entry level. Depending on the language he may or may not need to learn about the data direction registers.

Had we provided such a template to Mike along with a solution that used a single IDE start to finish he might still have the junebug.

It is bad to tug a new users in more then one direction. If a member is helping a poster it is good to help too. But do not try to send he OP off in another direction.

The choice of language is way less important then the presentation/help provided. If swordfish will not fix the integration problem we should suggest people use C18. Hell if you want to you can even use labels and goto in C.

While I am harping I would like to see the people at boostC fix it so you can click on an error in MPLAB and locate the error in the source.

3v0

 

[blueroomelectronics]

Just because you can use goto doesn't mean you should

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

The do until & while wend looked strange to me too.

That's the advantage of learning Pascal, it forces good programming practices

You 'can' use 'goto', but you shouldn't - and I had to really search to find out how once.

The PIC BASIC compiler I was involved in writing provides while/wend and repeat/until plus many others.

There's a list of commands here:

**broken link removed**

It was quite useable, but never finished enough to release - though it did produce far more sensible (and readable) assembler code than other compilers.

 

[futz]

While I am harping I would like to see the people at boostC fix it so you can click on an error in MPLAB and locate the error in the source.

That would be nice, but a very simple workaround is to just turn on line numbers. BoostC tells you the line number it thinks the error is at - you scroll to it. Often the error is somewhere else and caused by something else, but the error line number is a good place to start.

 

[Pommie]

Anyone that expects to learn embedded programming in a day or two is destined to stay ignorant. To think, I've worked on software projects where my personal input was close to a man year and you give up after two days. Looks to me like the disease of instant gratification has reared its ugly head.

Oh well, I guess it's the way this world is heading.

Mike.

 

[3v0]

That would be nice, but a very simple workaround is to just turn on line numbers. BoostC tells you the line number it thinks the error is at - you scroll to it. Often the error is somewhere else and caused by something else, but the error line number is a good place to start.

futz:
I think most everyone could figure that out but it is like going back to the 80's. How hard could this be to fix. Most often the compiler returns a formated string the interfaces to find the line number.

And I did say it was harping. BootC at least works with MPLAB.

Pommie:
I agree. Not only do people want instant gratification but they expect everything to be easy. Just the same, I think making thing less confusing up front is a step in the right direction.