Custom characters for the 2X16 parallel display

ScottL

I am writing an application that needs large numbers 0-9 for the 2X16 parallel LCD. I would like them to be 2 cells tall and 3 cells wide using the 10 vertical pixel height cell. If I understand correctly, the display only allows 4 custom characters in the 10 vertical pixel mode. Is there a work around? Does anyone have a way of generating BIG numbers? I found the double tall, single cell characters but the aspect ratio is too skinny to be easily read. -Scott

ScottL

Forgot to add a picture.

Jon Williams

There is no work-around that will work in a general-purpose application.· You can change character definitions on-the-fly, but doing that will cause your display to change and probably make it unreadable.

I've tackled this problem before and the best I could come up with was using standard 5x8 font mode and creating 2-digit tall characters.· The attached graphic shows the numbers and the eight customer characters required to display them.

PS: If you attach images as GIFs or JPGs it will be easier for most members to see them online -- not all browsers have native support for TIF.


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Jon Williams
Applications Engineer, Parallax

stamptrol

We had to do this on 4 x 20 display to create giant numbers. Essentially we used the custom characters to store the major components of the digits as Jon demonstrated above, then had a subroutine put together the pieces to make the digit(s) required. We were able have a 4 digit (plus one decimal pt) on a 4 x 20 display.
It actuallly worked very well and was faster that the the discription makes it sound.

Cheers

Jon Williams

Scott Edward wrote an N&V article a long time ago about building giant characters in a 4-line display, then he incorporated that feature into some of his products.

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Jon Williams
Applications Engineer, Parallax