Post by thread:16 bit square roots and PICLite 2.01a

Hi Folks, When I saw Chip Weller's Square Root Routine, I wanted to try it out with the PICList compiler to see what kind of code would be generated. I got it to work, and it is a very efficient routine. I've added it to the list of applications at: http://www.myke.com/piclite/piclite3.htm In getting the code to work, I discovered three problems with PICLite (one of them in "structure.mac"). The structure.mac problem was that I referenced an array variable without an index, which defaults always to the first element. The other two problems had to do with how the optimizer operates with sixteen bit numbers. One problem was with bitwise AND, OR, XOR statments in which "w" was previously loaded with one of the parameters (to save a cycle, I deleted the *wrong* load) and the other was with a sixteen bit subtract, the carry wasn't handled properly in operations that don't go over page boundaries. I've noticed that quite a few people have downloaded PICLite in the past three days; I apologise for the problems but Version 2.01a does work better. And I ask, if you find something that doesn't seem to be working right please let me know. Adding the structured constructs is actually making the code much more complex and I'm sure there are a few problems lurking with the conversion and optimizer routines when there are more complex if/elses nearby. Thanx to Chris for putting in the algorithm. myke PICLite has been upgraded! Check out version 2.00a at: http://www.myke.com/piclite PICLite now includes a Macro Processor that allows structured programming language constructs ("if/else/end", "while/end" and "for/end"). Look in on the life of the Rabitte family in Dublin; Roddy Doyle's "Barrytown Trilogy" in the Book Room this week, http://www.myke.com/Book_Room