gen
4 Display Module Series gen4-uLCD-24PT - 2.4”
©
2017 4D SYSTEMS Page 12 of 22 www.4dsystems.com.au
Gen4 Interface boards (Gen4-IB) ship with each gen4
Display Module unless otherwise stated. Simply
connect the supplied 30 way FPC cable into the ZIF
connector on the gen4 Interface Board, and connect
the Programming Cable or Adaptor into the 5-way
header on the Interface Board. You are now ready to
program using a 4D Programming Cable or 4D
Programming Adaptor (uUSB-PA5 or uUSB-PA5-II).
This can also be used to interface to other devices
such as a 4D Arduino Adaptor Shield, breadboard etc.
An alternative to using a Gen4-IB and a 4D
Programming Cable, or uUSB-PA5 Programming
Adaptor, is a single all in one board called the gen4-
PA (gen4 Programming Adaptor), which can be used
instead.
The gen4-PA incorporates the uUSB-PA5-II and gen4-
IB together essentially, creating a single module with
microUSB interface, and DIP style pads for GPIO
breakout of all the signals used on the gen4 Display
interface, which is useful for development or final
product use. Standard 2.54mm (0.1”) male pin
headers can be mounted so the module signals can
be interfaced to easily.
Please refer to the gen4-PA Datasheet for more
information.
8.
Software Overview - Language
The Picaso processor belongs to a family of
processors powered by a highly optimised soft core
virtual engine called EVE (Extensible Virtual Engine).
EVE was designed and created by 4D Systems in the
early 2000’s, and should not be confused by FTDI’s
solution of EVE, which was developed a decent
decade or so later.
EVE is a proprietary, high performance virtual-
machine with an extensive byte-code instruction set
optimised to execute compiled 4DGL programs.
4DGL (4D Graphics Language) was specifically
developed from ground up for the EVE engine core. It
is a high level language which is easy to learn and
simple to understand yet powerful enough to tackle
many embedded graphics applications.
4DGL is a graphics oriented language allowing rapid
application development, and the syntax structure
was designed using elements of popular languages
such as C, Basic, Pascal and others.
Programmers familiar with these languages will feel
right at home with 4DGL. It includes many familiar
instructions such as IF..ELSE..ENDIF, WHILE..WEND,
REPEAT..UNTIL, GOSUB..ENDSUB, GOTO, PRINT as
well as some specialised instructions SERIN, SEROUT,
GFX_LINE, GFX_CIRCLE and many more.
For detailed information pertaining to the 4DGL
language, please refer to the following documents:
“4DGL Programmers Reference Manual”
“Picaso 4DGL Internal Functions”
These are both available for download on the
of the 4D Systems website.
To assist with the development of 4DGL applications,
the Workshop4 IDE combines a full-featured editor, a
compiler, a linker and a downloader into a single PC-
based application. It's all you need to code, test and
run your applications.
4DGL is available to be written in two of the four
environments offered by the Workshop 4 IDE,
Designer and ViSi. The other two environments, Serial
and ViSi-Genie do not directly use 4DGL by the User
(Except in Workshop4 Pro, for ViSi-Genie), however it
is present in the background. Serial is an application
which runs, and that is written in 4DGL. ViSi-Genie
automatically generates 4DGL itself based on what is
configured in the GUI. More information about each
follows.
