Yes, I'm a newcomer and I've sort-of searched the relevant sections. The difficulty is, of course, determining the content of the threads from the title and having to 'view' each and every post (where there is a suitable reply/content that is).

So, if I have missed the answer by not being sufficiently thorough in my searching I do apologise however...... this is probably not 'new' but I'll ask anyway.

If I have a requirement to read serial data of a non-popular format (and here I'm referring to 4800 baud, 1 start, 9 data, 1 stop) i.e. 11-bit data packets, does PBP allow for this? Would I have to 'bit bang' to achieve a proper 'read' of such a serial datastream?

I would prefer to use the '84 PIC rather than one with a built-in UART (which means bit-banging anyway) but if there are any PICs with UARTS that can configure to 9 data bits I'll be happy to be suitably informed.

Similarly, coding examples would be gratefully appreciated.

My interest is to develop test equipment that can read the SEATALK data bus and I'm aiming to make a simple LCD blackbox to offer signal diagnosis of the SEATALK bus (I'm always haviing to attend to SEATALK errors on yacht instruments and would like to have a portable 'reader' to display signals/errors).

The hardware is the easy bit.

I have already reviewed Thomas Knaufs excellent disassembly of the SEATALK protocol and I know of some sites selling ready-made readers/NMEA converters but my ultimate aim is for this specific piece of stand-alone test equipment which would, if I could developed it myself, further improve my understanding of the SEATALK bus principles and allow me to incorporate routines that would further simplfy fault diagnosis of the SEATALK bus.

As a start, therefore, I am looking for code to read the serial data and display the sentences in the simplest format possible.

Has this been approached on this forum before? or has anyone any relevant experience, coding or links that would assist?

Many thanks for taking the time to review my post.

Dave