6 hours for a comma, a space, and some caps.....

[boroko]

I'm not sure if this will aid anyone, but I do feel the need to expose my own stupidity and hopefully make it easier for someone else.

The situation was this: I had a couple of software modules that were pretty much working on an '877A. I knew that I would need the power of an 18 series device, to I tried to move them over put them together on a 18F1230 after some clean up.

This is the first time I have used an 18F, and it uses Darrel's DT_INT so I expected that there would be a few pains.

Loaded up everything and changed the INT includes to the -18 versions. Tried to compile and got a bazzillion errors! The really fun part was that the errors were showing on MCS in lines that were in the 1400 range. My main program was only about 550 lines long,...hmmm. Started looking through DT_INTS-18.bas and ReEnterPBP-18.bas. They were 954 and 245 lines respectively. Were to look? Darrel's .asm in INTs started to make me even more confused. There were conditions for a 18F1230 that were different from the others. More issues! I had composed a post for the forum (which I loath doing) and tired to lay out the situation without sounding too stupid.

In the process of laying out the post, it occurred to me to try to strip almost everything out except the most essential lines. I opened it in a side-by-side comparison. I started to notice a few things. It wasn't the special configuration of the 1230, it wasn't the overwhelming 312 page datasheet or even the change to using -18 of DT_INTS.

The problems turned out to be all right here

 
ASM
INT_LIST  macro    ; IntSource,        Label,  Type, ResetFlag?
        INT_Handler   TMR1_INT,  _Transmit,   PBP,  yes
        INT_Handler   TMR0_INT,  _BlankGain,   PBP,  yes
        INT_HANDLER   CMP2_INT   _ GetEcho,    PBP,  yes
    endm
    INT_CREATE               ; Creates the interrupt processor
ENDASM

There are three errors that I let slip in there. they caused an unbelievable number of errors that I had no idea how to find.

I guess the moral of the story is this. Even if you are not completely understanding everything, there are ways to coax problems to show themselves. Just minimizing all of the distractions helped me divide and conquer. I thought I had worked out the modules and figured that the migration would be the issue. Turns out that it was just the simple stuff.
Keep trying!

and, yes, I realize that I haven't explicitly explained the errors, I wanted to "share" the learning opportunity.

Bo

[Navaidstech]

Bo...

don't sweat it. I'm sure we've all been there at one time or another.
I've been down that road before and best advice I can offer is this: walk away from it for a while (ie. go take a nap, walk, or something) then get back into it with a fresh mind - the mistake will stick out like a sore thumb.



just my $0.02

Alex

[Chris Barron]

I'm not sure if this will aid anyone, but I do feel the need to expose my own stupidity

The problems turned out to be all right here

 
ASM
INT_LIST  macro    ; IntSource,        Label,  Type, ResetFlag?
        INT_Handler   TMR1_INT,  _Transmit,   PBP,  yes
        INT_Handler   TMR0_INT,  _BlankGain,   PBP,  yes
        INT_HANDLER   CMP2_INT   _ GetEcho,    PBP,  yes
    endm
    INT_CREATE               ; Creates the interrupt processor
ENDASM

There are three errors that I let slip in there.
Bo

Okay if you're being stupid, then I will have to expose my extreme stupidity (and curiosity) by asking you to explain what the errors were in the code, please !

I'm not familiar with this interupt technique but if i were to use it what should I be aware of ?

[Archangel]

Hi Bo,
Don't feel like the Lone Ranger, we all have that soft spot in our foreheads (see mister_e's avatar ). What you might try in this particular situation is copy Darrel's code, into the top of your's, rather than including it, then <b> "I THINK" </b>MCS will compile and give you accurate line number info for the error.<br>
Chris:
extra space between int_list and macro, missing comma after CMP2_INT, MPASM is fussier than your 5th grade English teacher.

[ErnieM]

6 hours is nothing, I spent most of a working week finding some missing brackets on CODE THAT COMPILED WITHOUT EVEN A WARNING.

(Note from user: bad code (syntax) should provoke a good compiler to say something.)

[boroko]

Hi All,
I was presenting all this primarily show that this kind of thing can really take you for a ride.

Navaidstech: I agree that taking a break gives you new eyes to look at things. It doesn't make up for my ignorance, but it usually helps me.

Chris: Joe S. explained the things that I missed. To amplify, the third was the capitalization of the third INT_HANDLER. As for the interupt technique, it is a macro that is at the heart of DT_INTS. If you haven't used it before, you may want to look at it. I was afraid to use interrupts before I found Darrel Taylor's program that simplifies the whole process. Absolutely wonderful piece of work.

Joe S: I hadn't thought of literally copying the code in like that. That is obvious once you think of it and definitely a "soft forehead" moment.

Those are the kind of thing that I was trying to pull out of the list by starting this. Maybe a thread where people are exposing the traps that they have fell into and the way that they got out of them. A place to go to reduce some of the noise on the list and improve all of our skills. Maybe the effort will keep the list from burning out the major contributors, so we can preserve their attention for the cool stuff.

I hope that someday, when I grow up, one of my posts will become a sticky. Then I will have arrived.....

Bo

[Darrel Taylor]

I hadn't thought of literally copying the code in like that. That is obvious once you think of it and definitely a "soft forehead" moment.

Noooooo .... please don't do that.

That's my biggest pet peeve.
It's an Include module, not a cut&paste snippet.

And as you've already found out, the errors were in your code, not the include file, so it would have accomplished nothing.

Yes, you would have received errors with line numbers referenced to your main program file, but they would not have been any more informative since those lines would still not have pointed to the original problem. And now your main program is filled with stuff that looks like Russian or Chinese (a.k.a. ASM macros). Trying to find errors in your own code only becomes more difficult and confusing.

Then you end up editing something that shouldn't be edited and suddenly nothing works, and I get blamed again.

Put the Include file down and step away from the computer, before you hurt someone.
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