I’m working for the new team 2428 out of Sewickley, PA, and am having problems regarding MPLab. Well, more than just problems. Unfortunately I have not a clue were to start, how to program, and how to do much of anything with this software and I am looking for the most basic help imaginable. If anyone could direct me in the right direction, or has some helpful advice, I greatly appreciate it.
First off welcome to this community. I won’t try to say what has already been said before, I would suggest that you look here http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/showthread.php?t=30976 for some help.
If you need help beyond what is there then try finding a team nearby to get some more direct help. I find that even though Chiefdelphi is a great way to learn, I find that having someone you can talk face to face about your problems is a much more efficient way to fix your problems and learn more.
I’d suggest starting off with some available default code, so you can at least you can get the robot up and running.
As for customization…to properly use MPLAB, you need a combination of architecture and programming knowledge. The syntax is (essentially) ANSI C (not C++ or C#), and there are many books available on C programming. To really interface with the controller properly, you need to read up on the processor architecture (Microchip’s PIC18F8722). This means deciphering things like this:
TMR0L (the low byte of timer 0)
TMR1IF (timer one is full/overflowed)
Thankfully, IFI’s default code renames the ports to the names you see printed on the outside of the box. Also, Kevin Watson’s FRC code handles a lot of the deciphering I mentioned above. Both are good starting places.
A big thing to keep in mind is that the PIC doesn’t do floating point efficiently. This means that fractions/decimals/rationals slow the processor down. As an example:
i / 2
is more efficient than
0.5 * i
so, stick to integers as best you can.
In the end, programming the controller is a lot like algebra. But, C has its twists, so you need a good book on C to reference for syntax and errors.
-JEE