Limited Code Size

[joebanks]

As I have been talking about in the V2&3 section.
I currently own the student version of flowcode V4 and V5 which cost £49.99 but when building my project for hobby use only, I came across the problem that I can only program 50% of my PIC16f877a. This has ruined my project as I can no longer complete the code without paying £150 for the Pro version of V5 / £39.50 for V6 Home edition. I do no need/want any of the additional features in V6 apart from the ability to use the other 50% of the ROM of my PIC, hence why I do not want to pay £39.50 just for the ability to be able to program the other half of my PIC. I feel that £49.99 for what seems like basically a trail/demo version is UNBELIEVABLE and as a student i cannot afford to be paying £39.50 for the ability to program the other 50% of my PIC especially when the project is just for hobby use .

Does anybody know how to solve this without the need to pay a lot of money?

[joebanks]

I think I now have to compile using the Hi Tech C compiler but Flowcode and this compiler have many problems. Having tried this forums tutorial on using HiTech I have come across many errors when I compile ever the most simple of programs. I now think I will have to give up with the project and it was going so well

[Benj]

Hello,

If you use v6 then you will get a 30 day trial period for free with no restrictions. After this has expired if you purchase the PIC chip pack then this is much lower then the cost of a pro v5 license and also has the bonus that the code size is unlimited. You will still be restricted on which built in components you can use but at least in v6 you can create your own components if you so wish.

[joebanks]

Hello,

If you use v6 then you will get a 30 day trial period for free with no restrictions. After this has expired if you purchase the PIC chip pack then this is much lower then the cost of a pro v5 license and also has the bonus that the code size is unlimited. You will still be restricted on which built in components you can use but at least in v6 you can create your own components if you so wish.

Hi, thanks for your reply. I don't see why the program is so restrictive towards students/home users who have paid decent sums of money for both V4 and V5, it makes it impossible to create interesting programs.

Anyway my problem with flowcode V6 free version, is when i try to use it I get the "Activate Flowcode" screen. When I try to log in using the account I used to download it, I get the message "Activation Failed" "This is an invalid key. Please check that you have entered a legitimate username and license key"
What is this license key about? All it asks for me to enter is username and password...

Then when I try 30day_97143245 ....key... licence file, I get the same error. Even when my fire wall is turned off and ran as administrator and looking at the bug reports it seems many others are having this problem too.

[Benj]

Hello,

Hopefully the v6 activation is working correctly now. If not then let me know your account username and I will get it sorted for you.

I don't see why the program is so restrictive towards students/home users who have paid decent sums of money for both V4 and V5, it makes it impossible to create interesting programs.

I agree for a student it is a lot of money to pay but if you look at the cost just for a full featured stand alone C compiler you will soon see Flowcode really is exceptional value for money as the compiler is only a small part of the big picture.

http://www.microchipdirect.com/ProductS ... s=SW006011

Microchip do offer "free" C compilers but they also have code limitations as well as a reduced functionality optimiser which means your programs will not run as well as they could on the target and will be much bigger then expected.

We put a lot of time and effort into Flowcode so it has to pay the bills (At least 2 man years have gone into v6 so far if not more like 3 or 4 with all the working from home in our free time that we have put in). If we could spread word of mouth better about usability etc then maybe we could lower the costs a bit, but again marketing costs money. The 2K limitation is usually not a limitation for most student/home projects, at least I'm not aware of anyone else mentioning it in the past.

We did have a deal for v4 where if a university had bought a site license then we would offer the students free versions they could use on their home PCs for a year. Not sure if this is still available for v5 and v6 as not many Uni's took this offer up but could potentially be resurrected. At the end of the day if push comes to shove then why not ring our sales team, you never know what they will be able to do.

Also as I said via the PM if you can post your program on the forums and ask for help then we may be able to see ways to optimise your program to get it smaller.

[joebanks]

Hello,

Hopefully the v6 activation is working correctly now. If not then let me know your account username and I will get it sorted for you.

I don't see why the program is so restrictive towards students/home users who have paid decent sums of money for both V4 and V5, it makes it impossible to create interesting programs.

I agree for a student it is a lot of money to pay but if you look at the cost just for a full featured stand alone C compiler you will soon see Flowcode really is exceptional value for money as the compiler is only a small part of the big picture.

http://www.microchipdirect.com/ProductS ... s=SW006011

Microchip do offer "free" C compilers but they also have code limitations as well as a reduced functionality optimiser which means your programs will not run as well as they could on the target and will be much bigger then expected.

We put a lot of time and effort into Flowcode so it has to pay the bills (At least 2 man years have gone into v6 so far if not more like 3 or 4 with all the working from home in our free time that we have put in). If we could spread word of mouth better about usability etc then maybe we could lower the costs a bit, but again marketing costs money. The 2K limitation is usually not a limitation for most student/home projects, at least I'm not aware of anyone else mentioning it in the past.

We did have a deal for v4 where if a university had bought a site license then we would offer the students free versions they could use on their home PCs for a year. Not sure if this is still available for v5 and v6 as not many Uni's took this offer up but could potentially be resurrected. At the end of the day if push comes to shove then why not ring our sales team, you never know what they will be able to do.

Also as I said via the PM if you can post your program on the forums and ask for help then we may be able to see ways to optimise your program to get it smaller.

Thanks I understand now.

I still cannot get V6 to work, tried both offline and online methods. Username= joebanks

Thanks alot.

[Benj]

Hi Joe,

Ok your account should now be good to go. You may have to uninstall v6 and then re-download and install as the original installation had an specific issue with activation which we have now resolved.

Let me know how you get on.

[bluejetsthree]

Hello,

If you use v6 then you will get a 30 day trial period for free with no restrictions. After this has expired if you purchase the PIC chip pack then this is much lower then the cost of a pro v5 license and also has the bonus that the code size is unlimited. You will still be restricted on which built in components you can use but at least in v6 you can create your own components if you so wish.

I am facing a similar situation and was wondering if you can point me in the right direction on where to find the restrictions you mention above.
Thanks......

[kersing]

The limits are in the data sheet. For FC5 you could try searching the forums (top right is the search box). One of the threads is at: http://www.matrixmultimedia.com/mmforum ... f=5&t=3535 (link to data sheet is in one of the messages)
For FC6 the data sheet does not list any code limits (with a PIC chip pack applied). I am not sure if there is a code limit, MM will be able to tell us.

[bluejetsthree]

Hello,

If you use v6 then you will get a 30 day trial period for free with no restrictions. After this has expired if you purchase the PIC chip pack then this is much lower then the cost of a pro v5 license and also has the bonus that the code size is unlimited. You will still be restricted on which built in components you can use but at least in v6 you can create your own components if you so wish.

kersing,
In the above, reference was to where we could find what is restricted as in the last sentence v6.

Thanks for other info.

[kersing]

Take a look at the licence information for information on the different versions. If you want a list of the components included in the professional pack, see the pack information. All the information is available in the PDF data sheet downloadable from the main flowcode page as well.