12x2 LCD Character Displays , HD48770 compatible?

[aspeier]

Is the Flowcode3 Display Module (pararllel Mode) kompatible to the HD48770 Controller of LCD Displays?

Did it support 12x2 Displays (i only see 16x1, 16x2).

[Mark]

My take on the Hitachi display controllers is that they are all the same regardless of the lines and length of the actual LCD they drive. It is just that characters printed to memory locations (eg >16 on a 16x2) are not visible, but would be if you used a say 40x2 display.

If you print long enough the displays tend to wrap around and charcters start appearing on the second line.

[Steve]

Flowcode is designed to work with the Samsung KS0066U driver, which is compatible with the Hitachi HD44780.

The code generated by Flowcode is independent of the LCD display size, so it should work fine with a 12x2 display. Only the on-screen image and simulation change when the display size is set differently.

[having said that, I think there is difference with the "cursor" command - because the 4x20 display maps the memory differently to the 2x40 display]

[aspeier]

thanks to all

it is possible to dislay special characters with flowcode with **standard displays** with HD48770, e.g. with Crystalfontz 12x2

which are written before in the display memory area (character generator ROM / RAM).

I need special characters and don't need the chineese signs.

thanks

[Benj]

Yes you can program the LCD driver chip with special characters. However to do this you will probably have to write your own routine in software to do this. The device datasheet will specify things like relative timings on the output. The best way to do this would be to create a macro that will write a char to the LCD memory. eg byte character, byte mem_location.

[Mark]

Hi Benj,

I had in the back of my mind that the 'command' option in the LCD macro's list was for doing this sort of thing?

Mark

[Steve]

Yes, Mark. You can do this. The only thing you can't do with the LCD display is put it into 8-line mode and read back from the device.

[mytekcontrols]

This looks like as good a place as any to post a question I have on LCD Display character length parameters.

I would like to use a 28x2 line display, but obviously there is nothing that matches in the drop-down box within the LCD Component. However I gather that this doesn't matter as far as the real hardware display is concerned, and only affects the simulation. Is this true?

While we are talking about this, I also have a suggestion:
It would seem that a better approach to setting up the LCD display parameters, would be to incorporate 2 drop down boxes. One would be # of characters, and the other would be # of lines. This way you could have many more possibilities, while still keeping the drop-downs fairly short in length. Another, maybe even better method, would be to have 2 fill-in boxes, where the user could simply type in the # of characters and lines, thus giving ultimate flexibility and making for an adaptable component.

Last but not least, what would it take for me to maybe modify the present LCD Component, and give it a 28x2 selection?

Thanks ahead of time for any answers.

[Benj]

Hello Michael

Yes the number of characters on a single line should only affect the simulation. If you are using the standard Hitachi alphanumeric LCD driver then you get a fixed number of 40 characters per line, although obviously they are not all shown at once. This means the simulation should work correctly you just will not be able to see all of the horizontal characters.

There is some good ideas regarding the LCD size. I will pass your suggestion onto the Flowcode Engineer and see what he thinks. Im afraid that this is not editable by you as it is hard coded into the Flowcode C++.

[mytekcontrols]

Thanks for listening Ben, and confirming what I suspected

Yes the more I think about it; entering the parameters for "X" (# of characters) and "Y" (# of Lines) into text fields, would seem like a good approach. So as not to confuse people that are used to the present drop-down method, this could be added as an optional selection as shown below.




BTW I tried to upload this image to your server but it wouldn't take. Any reason why?
So I have it linked to my web domain instead.