> Yes, strings are a pain on the PIC. You could also get fancy and have
> predefined constant offsets into a string table, i.e.
>
> StrTable
>         retw    "String1",0
>         retw    "Long String",0
>         retw    "3rd string",0

There are some other tricks that can be handy for such things, e.g. if
there were an "addwf PC" at StrTable above, you could use something
like:

DumpStringN:
        movwf   N       ; Procedure to dump Nth string in above table [1=1st]
        clrf    Index
DumpLoop:
        movf    Index,w
        incf    Index,f
        call    StrTable
        iorlw   0       ; Check if W is zero
        btfss   Z
         goto   FindLoop
        decfsz  N
         goto   FindLoop
DumpLoop:
        movf    Index,w
        incf    Index,f
        call    StrTable
        iorlw   0       ; Check if W is zero
        btfsc   Z
         retlw  0
        call    PrintChar
        goto    DumpLoop

A bit of a hack, but I've found similar techniques to be sometimes useful
with the CCS compiler which does not include any really good methods for
doing the above.

BTW, another useful trick when writing code that should be equivalent to
  printf("Answer=%3d Result=%05D", answer, result);
is to code it like this [more or less]; note that if there weren't very
many printfs, it might be better to put more of the work in the "format"
section and less in the library section.  Note that "Format" is designed
to be used as a string in a string-print procedure.

Format:
        db      "Answer="
        movlw   answer
        call    IntPConvert
        goto    BGetHund
        goto    BGetTens
        goto    GetOnes
        db      " Result="
        call    IntPConvert
        goto    GetTenK
        goto    GenThou
        goto    GetHund
        goto    GetTens
        goto    GetOnes
        retlw   0

IntPConvert:
        bsf     blankflag
        movwf   FSR
        movf    IND,w
        movwf   TempL
        incf    IND
        movf    IND,w
        movwf   TempH
        goto    Convert ; My wonderful bin->dec convert routine

BGetThou:
        movf    Thou,w
        goto    GetWBlank
BGetHund:
        movf    Hund,w
        goto    GetWBlank
BGetTens:
        movf    Tens,w
GetWBlank:
        btfss   Z
         bcf    BlankFlag
        btfsc   BlankFlag
         movlw  $F0
        addlw   48
        return
GetTenK:
        movf    TenK,w
        goto    GetDigit
GetThou:
        movf    Thou,w
        goto    GetDigit
GetHund:
        movf    Hund,w
        goto    GetDigit
GetTens:
        movf    Tens,w
        goto    GetDigit
GetOnes:
        movf    Ones,w
GetDigit:
        addlw   48
        return