How is a PIC programmed?
A PICmicro is programmed by loading a strategic list of 1’s and 0’s into its ROM. Those 1’s and 0’s are created by software. The software can be assembly language, which is assembled into the 1’s and 0’s, or it can be a higher level language such as C or Basic that is first compiled into assembly language and then assembled into the 1’s and 0’s. From there a PIC programmer is used to take the 1’s and 0’s and store them into the PICs ROM. It does this by sending voltage signals to specific pins on the PIC in a method specified by Microchip. This is sometimes called serial programming since the PIC only requires two pins to send and receive the 1’s and 0’s (RB6 and RB7). You can build the PIC into a circuit and still program it. This is called In-Circuit Serial Programming or ICSP. A 1’s and 0’s file always has a .hex suffix so sometimes people just refer to it as a “dot hex” file. Most PIC programmers accept this file thus allowing you to pick the PIC programmer that fits your budget an
