> but I think the
> stamp development environment is likely to be amazingly fast, even compare
> to flash "bare" microcontrollers (and when the stamp came out, well before
> flash controllers were available, it was a real innovation!)

If you have a suitable PIC hardware cct with ISP and an ISP cable to eg
PICSTART Plus then you can compile program, groan and retry in well under a
minute.

STAMP has a debug  mode of sorts back to its terminal which the compilers
haven't but I have never found debugging at the level of programs you are
liable to do with a STAMP equivalent program. Flashing LEDs program
partitioning (and of course an oscilloscope) are good enough. You can also
have a serial port on any pin so can add your own debug routines to any old
PC as well.

> I believe that there's a "fractional stamp" implementation in an 16F84
> out there as freeware someplace; uses the internal eeprom instead of
> external code, with the accompanying limitations on program size.

It's quite crippled and incomplete and not really worth pursuing unless you
are specifically an enthusiast.



        Russell McMahon

--
http://www.piclist.com hint: The PICList is archived three different
ways.  See http://www.piclist.com/#archives for details.