How to develop a custom character generator?

[ozarkshermit]

Hi all

This question is mainly directed to Darrel Taylor or mister_e, regarding the excellent LCD character generators they have offered. My question is: What software is needed to actually DEVELOP the character generators?

I am in the process of making some LED Cubes, and would like to be able to simply generate the equivalent hex code (or decimal ) - by placing "x's" in boxes and have the resulting value be displayed for the rows. Each box relates to a LED position in a matrix (4 x 4 , 5 x 5, etc, with varying "levels"

The generator software I will need will be similar to the LCD character generators, only with more "boxes", i.e. up to 8 boxes per row, and 8 rows, rather than the smaller 5 x 7 pattern of the LCD
I can actually use the LCD character generator as is for anything up to a 5 x 7 matrix .

The largest cube I hope to build will be an 8 x 8 x8 matrix (512 LED's) , but I am starting small, my first one is a 3 x 3 x 3, using assembly software from other sites, and even though small, the patterns are mesmerizing. I want to use PicBasic Pro for my next ones. Also will be changing the hardware to use a couple of MAXIM 6969 LED drivers.

Can anyone provide a link to where I can find how to develop a character generator ? (or modify the LCD character generator to handle 8 x 8 )?

Thanks

Ken

[Darrel Taylor]

Mine was written in Javascript and relies heavily on Object Oriented programming.

mister-e's was written in Visual Basic but I'm not sure what techniques he used. And since he's no longer around, we may never know.

If I was going to do it again ... I'd probably use FLASH.

[ozarkshermit]

Thanks Darrel

For now I will use one of the existing LCD char generators, since they will be adequate for the 4 x 4 matrix that I am now building. Using one just makes it easier to visualize the various patterns.

Ken

[mark_s]

Thanks Darrel

For now I will use one of the existing LCD char generators, since they will be adequate for the 4 x 4 matrix that I am now building. Using one just makes it easier to visualize the various patterns.

Ken

Ken,

See if this works, it will do up to 16x16. Written by Ron Diol of Compsys its a great utility.

http://www.compsys1.com/workbench/Benchware/BinHex2/binhex2.html

[ozarkshermit]

Mark:

EXCELLENT . . .

That is just what I was looking for.

Thank You

Ken