MPLAB® IPE Software Requirements

Last modified by Microchip on 2023/11/10 11:02

The MPLAB® Integrated Programming Environment (IPE) uses the MPLAB X Integrated Development Environment (IDE) framework, Microchip Debugger (MDB), and hardware tool interfaces, along with their respective drivers, to provide programming capabilities. The following software must be installed on your PC to use the IPE application:

  • MPLAB X IDE v1.85 or greater
  • MPLAB IPE application (installed automatically with MPLAB X IDE)

MPLAB IPE is installed as part of the MPLAB X IDE suite. Once you’ve installed MPLAB X IDE, the IPE application can be accessed through the MPLAB IPE icon on your desktop or startup menu (see the figure). For Microsoft® Windows® installations, the MPLAB IPE must be run as an administrator for all features to be fully functional. To run as an administrator in Windows 7, go to Start > All Programs > Accessories > Command Prompt, right-click and select Run as Administrator.

MPLAB IPE logo

MPLAB X IDE Framework

MPLAB X IDE provides support for generating and executing unit tests based on its own simple test framework, the CUnit framework, and the CppUnit framework. The CUnit and CppUnit frameworks are open-source products that support the development of tests for C and C++ and provide harnesses for running the tests. MPLAB X IDE supports CUnit and CppUnit unit testing if the frameworks are separately installed on your system.

See the "C Unit Testing Framework" page for more information about downloading and using CUnit.

See the "CppUnit - C++ port of JUnit" for more information about downloading and using CppUnit.

Hardware Tools

A hardware tool debugs and programs a target device. Examples of hardware tools include in-circuit emulators and in-circuit debuggers which can be found on the "Supported Programming Tools" page.