>If OP's objective is to learn how PICs are actually programmed, then these
>are not the right choice since those details are hidden.

>On the other hand, if OP wants to write the VB software to integrate with
>something else he is doing, then communicating with the on-programmer PIC
is
>likely to be simpler and somewhat less frustrating than getting all the
>details of wiggling the target PICs lines.

However the various flavours of windows are steadily making the hardware
less accessible to the application program, so using hardware where the
actual programming is done independent of the PC is going to become a whole
heap easier. If a person really wants to get stuck into the programming
algorithms. then surely the way to do that is to build a Easyprog or Wisp
replacement, once they have got themselves bootstrapped up using one of
these devices, or some other suitable equivalent. We only have to look at
the number of requests here about the NPP programmer which is running into
problems because of the changing details of operating systems and hardware,
to see just how difficult such a route is.

Personally I would follow the advice to get one of these minimalist devices
that are known to work reliably, and get on with the interesting part of
ongoing life - the application project that provides the fun. Dealing with
programming algorithms - especially the myriad that Microchip seem to have
used - is like playing with the underlying operating system, not fun when
you need to do it, and it rapidly gets boring. There is more interesting
things to move on to, and let someone else deal with the boring bits.

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