Here's one that will make you guffaw a little.

I have just started programming a PIC, fresh project, etc. I set up new 
MPLab 8.01. I copy and past a bunch of C18 code from another project I 
did hoping to avoid issues with initialization. The previous project 
meticulously goes through every peripheral and 
enables/disables/configures it as required (I am using the same PIC as 
that project). I thought if I copied that code it would ensure that I 
got all the initialization right. I also copied some routines for 
reading/writing the EEPROM.

Well, I took an hour and went through the code to cut out all the cruft 
I did not need, and was pretty certain that I had everything set up how 
I wanted it (timers, ADCon, Interrupt Priorities, etc.). I decided that 
I would add a blinking light to indicate the status of the program 
during setup.... just to get things going.

Well, first the LED would not blink, and I realized the initialization 
routine was setting the TRIS to input. So, I set it to output, and the 
LED started blinking, but it was blinking faster than I wanted... so I 
slowed down the delay loop. Still blinking just as fast.

Bugger, something was funny. I looked through the code, found no obvious 
problems. Figured the WDT or some other reset was happening. Built code 
to read the reset RCON status and interpret it. But, it was normal. Set 
ICD2 to debug, and read RCON, and every reset was either POR or MCLR 
Reset as expected from ICD2 debug.

Finally, in frustration, I put a meter over the LED and discovered that 
even though the output pin was constantly high, the LED was still 
flashing.....

Hmmm... I had pulled a 'flasher' LED from my junk box. Replaced it with 
a standard LED, and wrote a mail to Piclist so that you can all laugh at 
me.... ;-)

2 hours of debug, and now a flasher-LED that has been clearly marked 
with a Sharpie...

Rolf
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