Hello Timothy & PIC.ers,

As has been pointed out by a few others, do some research on state-machines.
I had only a vague idea of the concept when I started using PICs, and
somehow (eesshh.. brain-burning stuff) produced my original products
without them.
The project definitions would not differ vastly from your own.

One day, browsing through the p*clist, I came across Andy Kunz's treatise on
his use of the things. He gave us some very tightly written asm code, which
I scratched my hair out trying to follow, but the concept was very clear
:--

LOOP_1      looping in a known state, give it a number (eg. 0-100).
 |
\/
monitor all possible trigger conditions which could kick the program to
another state.
 |
\/
on recognition of any such trigger (stimulus) call a transition subroutine,
followed by a destination state.
The transition subroutine *and* destination state are both optional, the
destination state can even be the original one.
 |
\/
no stimuli?  >> goto LOOP_1

The whole shebang gets formalised in a neat table, I've been adapting the
technique for +/- 4 years now & can't consider using any other way of
writing code for target apps. with multiple stable states.
I'll send you more info, off-list if you want.
..mmm... If Andy's around maybe he could comment & give us the latest
skinny on these..

        best regards,   John

>Date:    Tue, 18 Feb 2003 12:06:33 -0000
>From:    Timothy Box <Tim@TJBSYSTEMS.COM>
>Subject: [PIC]: Programming logic solving
>
>Hi all
>
>Being a self taught programmer I often waste a lot of time converting "I
>WANT TO DO XXXX" into code. Do our learned gentlemen have any pointers to
>how they would tackle the task or perhaps a good site.
>
>I know it all depends on exactly wha
..
<el snippo>


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