selecting a Programming Language for Your Microcontroller

Assembler

Assembler is the most certain language that you'll think using as you probably won't need to buy any other tools to use it. More than likely the manufacturer will contribute an accumulator for the chip and you won't need any books as all the instructions are in the datasheet and you just start coding.

Basic Microcontroller Architecture

This route to programming is very easy but you may be setting yourself up for problems later on as:

1. It is trivial to write short programs.
2. It becomes progressively more difficult to write large programs.
3. It seems to be the best choice as it gives the fastest code.
4. It seems to be the best choice as it gives the smallest code.

Assembler: Fast & small code

There is no doubt that accumulator gives the fastest and most optimized code (your brain is great at optimization than any compiler!) but accumulator is difficult - typically you'll spend ten times as long writing accumulator as you would writing in a high level language.

Assembler / Compiler Trade off

This is the trade off; to write the fastest most optimized code or to get the task solved more quickly.

Another problem with accumulator is that to do even the most trivial task you have to think about every aspect of the code and all implications on registers and register flags.

Even development a microcontroller accomplish the most trivial task is difficult e.g. For development a loop in accumulator you need to think about which register to use and which instructions all the while thinking about how those registers should not interact with the loop register/other registers etc.

Assembler: problem - changing the target

Another mystery is when you turn from one microcontroller to an additional one (even in the same gismo family) the accumulator instructions may be changed e.g. More instructions to heighten microcontroller performance. So you will have to learn an entirely dissimilar study set when lively whether to a new target microcontroller or lively to a dissimilar gismo within the same family i.e. Code re-use is not possible unless you stay with one microcontroller (or devices with a similar internal architecture).

High level languages

Hll: Retarget

Retargeting code to an additional one microcontroller is easier since the Hll will know the details of the new target i.e. study set, fuses etc. All you need to worry about is the definite differences between the dissimilar microcontrollers (in the same family this will be setting up the internal peripherals).

The foremost point is that the Hll takes care of the accumulator code needed to do the job.

Hll: Easy to understand.

The most beneficial aspect of a high level language (Hll) is that the language is written in a form you can in effect understand - there are no cryptic accumulator commands that you have to remember and most commands are made up of some motor code instructions - recovery you coding effort (often there are built in libraries of code e.g. Lcd driver, Serial port driver, I2C driver etc

So the Hll makes it easy to write code as it generates the accurate accumulator for the target microcontroller.

Hll : Whitespace

You can also make use of white space (areas of no code) to separate out the discrete operations within the schedule - typically accumulator code is just one great big list that is in effect very difficult to read - I know there are comments but you need to commentary almost every line so that man else can

understand the code.

Hll: Task splitting

One of the best features of a Hll is that you can split tasks into separate functions that you can join on them individually (as the Hll takes care of local variables etc.). For accumulator even when using a call study you have to take care of preserving the register state - in the Hll it's all done

for you.

Hll: Code re-use

Once you learn the Hll you will find it easy to read code written by other habitancy and you will be able to re-use code that you have already written whereas with accumulator you will permanently need to analyze the code to see if it fits in with your new functions.

The only decision then is which high level language? There are in effect three contenders Basic, C and Pascal - these are the most popular languages and for popular microcontrollers there will be an Hll compiler for each one. I'll just list the advantages and disadvantages of each

Basic Advantages

1. Very easy to learn and use.
2. A Basic compiler will furnish code that runs fast as a C compiler.
3. Many in built functions (depending on compiler).
4. Very popular - large user base with many example programs.

Basic Disadvantages

1. Non standard language.
2. If using an interpreted Hll will run very slowly.

Note: Because the language is not standardized it will be difficult to move code to a new processor target type.

Pascal Advantages

1. Easy to learn and use.
2. A Pascal compiler will furnish code that runs fast as a C compiler.
3. Many in built functions (depending on compiler).

Pascal Disadvantages

1. Not as popular as C - so not as many compilers.
2. A bit wordy - it was originally intended as a teaching language.
3. Not as flexible as C.

C Advantages

1. Compiled language - always runs fast.
2. Standardized language (Ansi)- easier to port to dissimilar compilers / target devices.
3. Many compilers available.
4. Many in built functions (depending on compiler).
5. Very popular - large user base with many example programs.
6. Used in many dissimilar industries.
7. Usable at the hardware level as well as higher abstraction levels (although C++ is great for very abstracted programming models).

C Disadvantages

1. Hard to learn at first.
2. Strong type checking means you spend time pleasing the compiler (although this protects you from development errors).

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selecting a Programming Language for Your Microcontroller

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