Xiaofan Chen wrote:
> Olin's programmer does not really belong to open source because of the
> license limit.

That's quite unfair.  Just about all "open" software has some usage
limitation.  People seem to consider GPL source "open", although its
restrictions can be rather onerous in some cases.  My restrictions are
different, but the important point is the code is open for all to see.  If
you require that "open" also means totally free to use for whatever you want
in any way you want, then most of what is commonly referred to as "open"
isn't, including everything from the Open Software Foundation.

If your goal is to make your own firmware for a USBProg, then my copyright
doesn't stop you.  Note that you could even sell your modified code without
having to disclose the source, which is something you couldn't do with GPL
code.

> It is also not easy to hack as well.

Sure it is.  The source code and build scripts are all there.  Once you
install the software according to the directions, have MPLAB installed
properly, and set the MPLABDIR environment variable according to the
directions, the build script BUILD_EUSB_EXPIC.BAT should just work.  Now you
can make incremental modifications to the firmware as you want.  I also
challenge you to find better documented PIC programmer source code anywhere.

Microchip has used several different programming algorithms with many
different flavors, so a PIC programmer that supports a wide range of PICs is
not going to be trivial.  I just checked, and the total USBProg firmware
source code is 13.5K lines of code.  However it is modularized, with the
largest module that implements a programming algorithm (24H, 30F, and 33F)
only being 1044 lines of code, and that is further broken up inside using
numerous subroutines and macros.

What exactly did you find "not easy to hack"?  Did you even try or look at
the source code?  I'm generally willing to help people with it.

> EasyProg's source
> codes have been available for years and nobody has even write the
> host software for it under Linux. The EmbedInc programming
> specification
> is also available long ago and only one very old attempt was made to
> use
> it with Wisp628 (http://www.philpem.me.uk/elec/pic/easyisp/).

And this is the fault of the code or the specification how exactly?

I think this mostly points out that open source is overrated.  Far too many
people make a big deal about whether code is open or not, but in the end
most people just want to get their job done and not have to screw with their
tools to do so.  However, I recognize that a small few do want to hack the
code, so I've made it available and am even willing to help.  What more
exactly do you want?

> And hacking a programmer is actually difficult for PICs. Even though
> PICkit 2's source codes are available, it is not really that easy to
> understand it thanks to the complexity of Microchip programming
> specifications.

Yes, the programming specifications are complex, and you shouldn't expect to
understand code that implements them without understanding the
specifications.  However, have you looked at my code?  I think you will find
its documentation to be above all others.


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