Microchip upgrades the free Code Configurator plugin for the MPLAB X IDE to accelerate and simplify the development of 8-bit and 16-bit PIC MCU firmware

     Microchip Technology has announced an upgrade to its MPLAB code Configurator plug-in, extending support for PIC MCUS from 8-bit devices to 16-bit devices. This code development tool can greatly reduce application development time and improve the design experience of developers. Building on this tool's widespread use in 8-bit product applications, Microchip's newly released MPLAB code Configurator will extend support to more than 50 16-bit devices.

     The MPLAB Code Configurator is a free, user-friendly plug-in tool for the MPLAB X Integrated Development Environment (IDE) that utilizes drivers and a graphical user interface (GUI) to control and drive peripherals within the PIC microcontroller in a simple, clearly documented driver API. The configurator tool uses an intuitive GUI to configure peripherals, greatly simplifying software development and helping designers who use 8-bit and 16-bit PIC microcontrollers for application development accelerate their time-to-market. With this new tool, users can easily change peripherals configuration and add or remove peripherals for their projects. In addition, the code generated by the tool is secure and reliable, making efficient use of CPU and storage resources.

     The tool provides many powerful features, such as visual Settings for I/O pin management in chip-level view and table view. In addition, once the system-level clock rate is set, the tool automatically calculates the timer period, duty cycle, and baud rate of the peripherals. With a simple drag-and-drop style interface, the tool generates easy-to-read code, including peripheral configuration Settings, drivers, and pin maps to effectively eliminate application development barriers. Designers will benefit greatly from this easy-to-use code development solution to better meet the challenges of increasingly short product design cycles and shrinking budgets.

     Joe Thomsen, vice president of MCU16 at Microchip, said: "MPLAB code configurator not only simplifies application development investment, but also reduces time to market. Now the tool has added support for the PIC24 family of products. It has a simple graphical interface that allows you to set up device peripherals and pins, giving you a head start on application code development."

     MPLAB code configurator now can be downloaded for free from http://www.microchip.com/MPLABCodeConfig-Page-012615a. The latest version of the MPLAB Code configurator adds support for more than 50 16-bit PIC MCU products in 6 different families, It includes PIC24FJ128GA310, PIC24F16KM204, PIC24FJ128GC010, PIC24FJ128GB204, PIC24FJ64GB004 and PIC24FJ64GA104 series devices. It also supports more than 140 8-bit PIC MCU products, including the new PIC16LF155X, PIC16F161X, PIC16F17XX and PIC18F14K22 families of devices.