I still haven't been able to get a response from the vdip when I connect it to the PIC and LCD. Still weird characters come out of the LCD. I'm using a 4Mhz xtal oscillator right now because when I tried to use a 20Mhz xtal the pic would not respond to any program..Do you think the oscillator has got something to do with it?

If you could give me a schematic of vdip connected to the pic16f877a including the extra components, that would really help...