AVR-Chat

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Mike Harrison" <mike@whitewing.co.uk>
To: <AVR-Chat@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Saturday, March 22, 2008 7:19 PM
Subject: Re: [AVR-Chat] C programming on AVR


> On Sat, 22 Mar 2008 11:03:14 -0700, you wrote:
>
>> I recently moved from assembly programming to C for the AVR for
>> a project, teaching myself mostly.  It has been torturous, for me
>> especially because I'm originally a hardware guy.  Programming
>> in assembly over the last 5 years has been straightforward, and
>> an easy understanding of the pins and resources of each micro.
>> However, the incredibly klugey nature and structure of the C
>> compilers and makefile systems to me was and still is horrendous.
>
> I'd have to agree, but this is entirely down to the compiler producers - 
> it doesn't need to be that
> hard.
> In most cases, any particular chip will have a set of default settings 
> that will be useable for the
> majority of people, at least until they get the hang of things, and a good 
> toolchain will make it
> easy to start off a simple project with minimal fiddling.
>
> An example of how  easy this can be is Hi-Tech's PIC C compiler - just do 
> #include <pic.h> and you
> can compile & run a project in MPLAB pretty much straight away with no 
> fiddling about.
>
> IAR's Embedded workbench C for the AVR isn't too bad, as the default 
> linker options are sensible and
> easily changed, although th ewhole porject/workspace thing, and default 
> directory structure can be a
> bit tedious where all you want is  asimple single source and object file
> Their ARM toolset is another story - I still need to refer to my 'to-do' 
> list every time I start a
> new project... I doubt anyone with no example projects to look at could 
> ever get this working with
> the JTAG debugger from the docs alone..

I use Rowley CrossWorks for ARM and MSP430 development, it's very good. They 
have an AVR version, but I haven't tried it (I prefer assembler).

Leon
--
Leon Heller
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