Hi guys,

Thanks for your help.
Today, I read the docs for PICBASIC pro compiler and discovered that a # had to be added to display the ascii value. In fact I read this before but it never occured to me it could be important.
I wrothe a #before the variable name and ... miracle, the value displayed right on my LCD, inf fact it was just displaying *some* value of the byte, not in ascii so I was seeing strange characters.

I still have a technical question.
I read that if used as Input pin, the pin 4 (RA3) had to be linked to VDD thoough a pull up resistor to prevent erratic behavior of the PIC. Is that right? What then should be the value of the resistor? 10K?

As for now, no pull up is connected to the MCLR pin and everything works fine.