Beginner's Guide To Embedded C Programming: Using The Pic Microcontroller And The Hitech Picc-Lite C Compiler (Power, Politics, and the World)

I am a professional programmer in C, C++, and Java, but I have not worked with Micro-controllers since very early in my career, when Dinosaurs roamed the earth. I bought this book primarily on the strength of Mr. Hellebuyck's magazine articles, as a means to get MPLAB and the compiler environment set up on my machine quickly and with little effort. Frankly, that alone was worth (to me at least) the price of the book, since the MPLAB and compiler docs are pretty much written for people who already know how to install and use them.For those of you who have never programmed in C before, the book explains things in a way that is clear to the beginner, provides a firm foundation of programming concepts, and that will keep you from getting stuck, frustrated, and giving up. A more advanced book may contain more projects and maybe even more interesting projects, but that will do you little good if you lack the basic language and programming environment skills to make use of those projects.I would like to explicitly reply to the reviewer who gave this book a "2" rating, which I think is undeserved. The reviewer complained about about Mr. Hellebuyck's grammar, syntax, use of fonts, and other items that are, in my opinion, irrelevant to the content of the book. The content is superb, and that is far more important than style in a technical book. The reviewer also complained about the basic nature of the information in the book - the use of screen shots, basic programming constructs, etc. The point is, the book is titled "Beginner's Guide to ..., and that is exactly what it is. These items help a rank beginner get started. I think the book does a credible job helping these folks get up to speed. Finally, he stated the book was overpriced. I very much disagree, and believe this book to be well worth its price to the audience for whom it was intended.If you are a beginning programmer, or not a programmer at all, this is a great place to start. Yes, you will outgrow it eventually, but so what? It gets you where you need to go. Buy this book, do the examples, learn C, then get a more advanced book. In the meantime you will have a LOT less hair pulling in the process.By the way, I have no relationship, personal or business, with Mr Hellebuyck.

It has been quite helpful to me (a NON " C" programmer) - to be able to start learning how to program this type of microprocessor in something other than low level assembly code. It is above the level of a "C for Dummies" book, but not so far that I can not follow the concepts. My only critique would be the limitation to the one processor in his discussions and examples. I can understand his reasoning in his approach, but a fuller understanding of the applying C to other Microchip processor families involved would have been nice. Overall a good buy.

I purchased this book after doing a little research on what books people said did a good job explaining embedded c programming to beginners. I started going through the book and ran into an issue compiling one of the projects. Somewhat frustrated, I went to the author's homepage and just fired off an e-mail that basically said, "hey what the heck is wrong here?" To my surprise, he responded within an hour and explained that the latest version of the compiler I was using changed from what was the standard when he wrote the book and he already had sent out the fix in a newsletter and happily sent me a copy so I could make the fix and continue making progress. I almost forgot, I sent him the e-mail around 10 PM! It was a very simple fix but I would have spent a bunch of time struggling because I thought maybe it was something I did wrong. So if you had any hesitations about buying the book, just know that the author is responsive to questions and stands behind his products. That's worth way more than the price of admission in my eyes! Thanks Chuck and keep up the good work!

I have a fair amount of experience with basic and some assembly programming. I know virtually nothing about C, but wanted to learn it because of all that I have heard about how useful it is for pic programming. I bought this book after looking around the web and waited almost 2 weeks for it to be delivered. It is, without a doubt, THE WORST programming book that I have ever seen. It is an incredibly poor value for its cost, is very superficial, and contains virtually nothing about how C really works.Prior to receiving the book, I downloaded a few old C tutorials from the web and started working through them. Although these tutorials were designed for C programming on desktops, they were far better than what this book offers. The Hi Tech compiler has an extensive manual and contains all of the information needed, although it is very complex. That said, a free C tutorial and the manual are all you need.This book is so poorly written that it makes reading a chore. Many of the sentences are run-on and difficult to read. The first few chapters continually refer to information that will be presented later, leaving the reader an with incomplete picture of what is happening. The book is poorly indexed and poorly organized. In short, it is simply horrible.I am terribly disappointed in this book. It fails to meet any of my expectations. the writing is so bad that it interferes with the minimal factual content present. I plan to sell the book and simply swallow the $ 30 dollar loss. To call this book abysmal would be to overly praise it.

For those who want to start programming the PIC MCUs using the C language this is the right tool. Extremely simple and clear, the author teaches step by step how to use the Microchip's PICKIT2 with the PIC 16F690 and the freely downloadable HI-TECH PICC-LITE C Compiler (the version included in the CD that comes together with the PICKIT2 isn't working).I did all the experiments and everything worked fine even though there are only few of them and the matter could have been treated more widely. Content rather poor for the price of the book.

This book is well worth the money useful in understanding C language and using pic microcontrollers for beginners but there was room for improvement it's useful that you can down load the code other wise you would have too fault find as there are typing errors

Il contenuto fa riferimento a tool di sviluppo obsoleti. Il libro e' un po' datato forse edizione 2008?Pensavo fosse piu' aggiornato anche se alcuni concetti base sono sviluppati chiaramente

Some of the material is dated, but is adaptable to current microchip side.

Sehr Einfach und deutlich. Alles wirkt wie beschrieben. Es ist auch praktisch, die Beispiele können auch modificiert werden für was ich brauche.

Good and clear introduction to PIC C programming for newbie hobbyist like me. There is some repetition of explanation of how various programs C work if reading the book cover to cover. For me that was unnecessary although the book is a good read nonetheless.