PIC versus AVR

mc wrote:
>>>62-character length limit on the full path to the file.  Does AVR Studio 
>>>cooperate fully with normal Windows security practices, or does it, too, 
>>>require you to loosen security on the computer in order to run it?
>>
>>Are you forced to install in C:\Program Files, or do you mean, you must 
>>have write permissions to the EXE host directory ?
>>( which is slack of them, if true )
> 
> 
> The latter.  Microchip MPLAB requires you to have write permissions in 
> something under C:\Program Files, presumably its own directory.  I don't 
> know what it writes there, or whether different users of the same computer 
> will disrupt each other.  In order to use MPLAB we have to loosen security 
> on our computers by letting all users write in that directory.

  Have you raised this with microchip ? - it is by no means a unique 
problem, and they do need to clean up their act, so point all this out 
to them.
  If they realise MPLAB is being _removed_ from educational classes 
because of simply slack SW design, I'm sure they'll move very fast  to 
remedy it. [ well, they should; if they can't be bothered, then they 
deserve the consequence ]

  Would having the project directory on a FLASH drive be a security risk 
? - I see they are getting ever cheaper.

-jg

>> The latter.  Microchip MPLAB requires you to have write permissions in 
>> something under C:\Program Files, presumably its own directory.  I don't 
>> know what it writes there, or whether different users of the same 
>> computer will disrupt each other.  In order to use MPLAB we have to 
>> loosen security on our computers by letting all users write in that 
>> directory.
>
>  Have you raised this with microchip ? - it is by no means a unique 
> problem, and they do need to clean up their act, so point all this out to 
> them.

Yes, I've been corresponding with them about this.  I'm also pressing them 
to make the old 62-character path length limit go away, because it is now 
very common for paths on a Windows system to be that long or longer 
(C:\Documents and Settings\blahblah\My Documents\PIC projects\myprog.asm). 
The limit is actually in the .COD file format, which they don't control. 
You can work around it by first adding a linker script to your project (so 
the linker will run, rather than assembling directly to HEX) and then 
turning off COD file generation.  I argue that this should actually be the 
default, since there are more people who need long paths than people who 
need COD files.

>  If they realise MPLAB is being _removed_ from educational classes because 
> of simply slack SW design, I'm sure they'll move very fast  to remedy it. 
> [ well, they should; if they can't be bothered, then they deserve the 
> consequence ]
>
>  Would having the project directory on a FLASH drive be a security risk 
> ? - I see they are getting ever cheaper.

Actually, that's how we did a lot of our projects last year!  Flash drive 
reliability isn't perfect and I urge people to make hard-disk copies often.

> By lockdowns I do not mean the poor attempt on Windows to have workstation
> user/permissions, that is nearly always circumvented as all users have
> to have LOCAL administrator rights for the crap applications to run.

The Windows permission system works fine except for -- as you say -- the 
ineptly written applications that require the user to have more rights than 
a user is supposed to have.

I am a strong believer in blacklisting such software:  "THIS SOFTWARE 
ENDANGERS THE SECURITY OF THE COMPUTER ON WHICH IT IS INSTALLED."

mc wrote:
> 
>>>> Well, gee, I only just finished writing several thousand words
>>>> on the topic... here's the dime version:
>>>
>>> Previous postings here, or something else?  I'd be glad to read
>>> it if you've made a web site or something...
>>
>> Both. There was a long thread in this NG recently, I think the
>> title was something like "about the MSP430", and we got into pros
>> and cons of these three architectures. Some very detailed stuff
>> in there, IIRC from Senor Kirwan.
> 
> Thanks.  I just found your web site and realized who you are.  I
> read your shoestring book quickly a while back and enjoyed it. 
> I'm a book author myself (www.covingtoninnovations.com/books.html)
> but not in this exact field. (Yet! :)
> 
> All this is very useful.  Thanks for posting it.

Please do not strip attribution lines (Joe said) for material you
quote.  For example, "who you are" is meaningless without the
attributions.

-- 
Chuck F (cbfalconer@yahoo.com) (cbfalconer@maineline.net)
   Available for consulting/temporary embedded and systems.
   <http://cbfalconer.home.att.net> USE maineline address!

"CBFalconer" <cbfalconer@yahoo.com> wrote in message 
news:44D402FD.2AE9BB9B@yahoo.com...
> mc wrote:
>>

larwe wrote:

>>>>> Well, gee, I only just finished writing several thousand words
>>>>> on the topic... here's the dime version:
>>>>

mc wrote:

>>>> Previous postings here, or something else?  I'd be glad to read
>>>> it if you've made a web site or something...
>>>

larwe wrote:

>>> Both. There was a long thread in this NG recently, I think the
>>> title was something like "about the MSP430", and we got into pros
>>> and cons of these three architectures. Some very detailed stuff
>>> in there, IIRC from Senor Kirwan.
>>

mc wrote:

>> Thanks.  I just found your web site and realized who you are.  I
>> read your shoestring book quickly a while back and enjoyed it.
>> I'm a book author myself (www.covingtoninnovations.com/books.html)
>> but not in this exact field. (Yet! :)
>>
>> All this is very useful.  Thanks for posting it.
>
> Please do not strip attribution lines (Joe said) for material you
> quote.  For example, "who you are" is meaningless without the
> attributions.

Sorry, my oversight.  Missing data restored above.

On Fri, 4 Aug 2006 17:11:37 -0400, "mc" <look@www.ai.uga.edu.for.address> wrote:

>> I stay as far away from Windows as I can, so I can't say that I've
>> looked deep enough at AVR Studio to answer your question. But I can say
>> that the Atmel team appears to be trying harder than the Microchip folks
>> at providing development tools. And unlike Microchip its actually
>> practical to code and debug an AVR without Windows.
>
>That's good; that means they're aware of PC operating systems.  If they 
>support two, they'll probably support *both* of them better than if they had 
>only supported one, because every OS opens your eyes to important 
>characteristics of other OSes.

I have used both AVR Studio and MPLAB extensively (On Win2000)  and AVR Studio has been consistently
significantly more flaky and problematic than MPLAB over many years. AVR Studio's editor still
doesn't work properly in debug mode FFS!

"mc" <look@www.ai.uga.edu.for.address> wrote in message
news:TDTAg.46058$Nt.40021@bignews8.bellsouth.net...
>
> Yes, I've been corresponding with them about this.  I'm also pressing them
> to make the old 62-character path length limit go away, because it is now
> very common for paths on a Windows system to be that long or longer
> (C:\Documents and Settings\blahblah\My Documents\PIC projects\myprog.asm).
> The limit is actually in the .COD file format, which they don't control.
>

There is a partial solution, SUBST.  All of my dev work and directories are
on drive G:

Subst allows a directory to be mapped as a drive, it's an old DOS command.
Also still shipped with XP too.  :)  It's partner is JOIN.

SUBST G: D:\Program Files\Microchip\MPASM Suite

"Jim Granville" <no.spam@designtools.co.nz> wrote in message 
news:44d3c2b2@clear.net.nz...
> Wilco Dijkstra wrote:

>> These are Luminary peripherals. The Cortex-M3 peripherals are
>> described in the TRM. You can add more peripherals but you
>> can't change/remove the standard ones.
>
>  Just to clarify, what you call standard peripherals, is then the 
> interrupt controller/timer/profiler/breakpoint unit
> [Rather like the MDI potion of the ARM7TMDI standard ? ]
> ( and timer here is part of profiler, not a generic timer ? )

Yes, you could think of it as core and debug oriented peripherals,
but it's not at all like the ARM7tdmi (which doesn't have any of this
apart from JTAG based break points and watch points).

There is a 24-bit timer in the NVIC which can be used as software
watchdog, OS tick or a general timer. The 32-bit counter in the
DWT is used for performance monitoring and profiling.

> - what most uC users would call peripherals, like 
> ADC/UART/CaptureCompare/UpDnCounters/PWM,
> are all "not standardised" ?

Correct.

>  I'm not sure how you can make different sizes of RAM and CODE, and
> NOT change the memory map, but perhaps you meant 'base addresses' or 
> similar ?

Yes, the standard memory map defines where flash/RAM/perhiperhal
space is, which areas support bit banding etc. The actual memory size
is device specific of course.

Wilco 

"Aly" <retro@dial.pipex.com> wrote in message 
news:b4GdnYEHTPXz4UnZRVnytw@bt.com...
>
> "mc" <look@www.ai.uga.edu.for.address> wrote in message
> news:TDTAg.46058$Nt.40021@bignews8.bellsouth.net...
>>
>> Yes, I've been corresponding with them about this.  I'm also pressing 
>> them
>> to make the old 62-character path length limit go away, because it is now
>> very common for paths on a Windows system to be that long or longer
>> (C:\Documents and Settings\blahblah\My Documents\PIC 
>> projects\myprog.asm).
>> The limit is actually in the .COD file format, which they don't control.
>
> There is a partial solution, SUBST.  ...
> Subst allows a directory to be mapped as a drive, it's an old DOS command.
> Also still shipped with XP too.  :)  It's partner is JOIN.
> SUBST G: D:\Program Files\Microchip\MPASM Suite

Yes, I know, but end users in 2006 ought not to have to do kluges like this 
to run the current version of software.

"mc" <look@www.ai.uga.edu.for.address> wrote in message
news:ol2Bg.46464$Nt.35383@bignews8.bellsouth.net...

>
> Yes, I know, but end users in 2006 ought not to have to do kluges like
this
> to run the current version of software.
>
>

Ideally in 2006 we wouldn't be needing electricity generated from burning
prehistoric animals that died a million years ago.

You wanted a solution, I gave it to you.