Arduino

What is Arduino?

Arduino is an open-source electronics platform made of ready-to-use boards and free software. It began in Italy in the 2000s as a way to make electronics easy for students, artists and hobbyists, and it grew into a worldwide community.

Boards

The Arduino Uno is the classic beginner's board. It uses an ATmega328P chip, has a USB connector for power and programming, and has rows of pins for digital and analog connections. There are many other boards, from tiny ones to more powerful ones, and extra boards called shields can plug in to add features.

The Arduino IDE

The Arduino IDE is the free program you use to write code, check it for mistakes and send it to the board over USB. Programs are written in a simplified form of C++, and the IDE comes with many examples to learn from.

The sketch: setup() and loop()

An Arduino program is called a sketch. Every sketch has two main parts:

• setup() runs once, when the board starts. Use it to prepare pins.
• loop() runs again and again, for as long as the board has power.

void setup() {
  // runs once
}

void loop() {
  // runs forever
}