In my Graduation project I need to send data from computer to microcontroller to control the position of a stepper motor

Most of the examples I have seen use the legacy parallel port. unfortunately parallel port is not available anymore.

My Question is what are the alternatives that available nowadays and compare between them from the following perspectives: hardware needed, complexity, ability to use with C++ and PIC microcontroller.

I am Using C++, Windows 7, PIC microcontroller.

If you point me to any reference I will appreciate it very much