Posted on 17 Comments

How to Program an Arduino

Do you own Arduino and looking to program it as per your need? You have landed to the right article.

Here in this article, we will learn how to program the Arduino board. There are many types of Arduino available, but Arduino Uno is most common. So when you are planning to build something for your project, make sure you do a bit of research on the features and versions.

Step 1

The first step to start programming Arduino is to install the Arduino programmer, which is also known as IDE. You can install Arduino programmer on Windows, Linux or MAC machine

Step 2

Now go ahead and connect your Arduino board to the USB port of your PC. You might need to have a specific cable. Make sure you’ve reconfigured the serial-port address as every Arduino posses unique serial-port.

Step 3

Select the type of board and the serial in the Arduino programmer software.

Step 4

Before beginning with your hardcore coding, make sure you do a test using the preloaded programs that are called sketches. You will find these within the Arduino programmer software itself. To test it, just select the sketches and press the “Upload” button. You will find that the Arduino board has started responding to the code and if you have uploaded the program to blink LED light, it will start blinking.

Step 5

There are only two ways to upload the code to Arduino, one is by writing your code or you can copy and paste from anywhere else. Arduino sketch has five parts.

  1. Header: it describes the sketch and its author
  2. Section: that defines the variables
  3. Setup Routine: used to set up the Arduino so that you can run preliminary code
  4. Loop Routine: This is used when you upload code and execute it repeatedly until the sketch is stopped
  5. Other Section: This is the section that can be used to mention other functions that get activated during the setup loop routines

To upload the code, click on the “Upload” button and your Arduino board is ready to use. Now you can disconnect it from the PC and start using it in your project.

Here is a simple code to blink LED light

Posted on 12 Comments

Arduino: Control 2 Servo Motors with a Joystick

In this tutorial you will learn how to control 2 servo motors using a Joystick module with the help of Arduino. 

What can I do with this setup?

Great question! The first video shows a clever setup using a pan/tilt bracket kit which allows you to mount a sensor to it and control which direction it faces (submitted by a fan ????). The second example shows how you could use the motor setup in an RC car to control both steering and speed.

Materials

Here is a list of the materials we used for this project. It’s not important that you get these exact same items, you can switch out any of these parts with something you’re more comfortable using.

Circuit Diagram

Here’s a quick look at the circuit we’ll be building. If you’re comfortable with building electronics, you can use this as your guide. But don’t worry! If you’re not so sure or get stuck at any point, we have step by step instructions below.

~split~


Control Servo with Joystick

Control 2 Servo Motors with Arduino

Arduino Joystick Servo Control

Posted on 8 Comments

What is Arduino?

Arduino is an open hardware and software platform used to develop an infinite amount of creative or technical devices. It’s famous among artists and electronic engineers who work on developing interactive installations and new media projects. Since Arduino has open hardware structure, it can be built by hand or can be purchased pre-assembled. The open structure of an Arduino board even lets users adapt it in any way they need.

A pre-assembled Arduino gets a microcontroller which is programmed using Arduino development environment. This easy to use platform along with the open source community that has developed over the years essentially allows anyone to program and build complex systems with minimal coding knowledge. If you go deeper however, you will come to know that Arduino programming is the simplified version of C and C++ programming languages and in Arduino they are called “Sketches”.

What is an Arduino Used For?

If you search the internet, you will find Arduino to be the brain of many projects. They are used in everyday objects and are also used to build many complex scientific devices. Many students, specifically belonging from electronics stream, use Arduino to build projects. People dealing with robotics also use Arduino. Many communities have even started using Arduino to make IoT based applications like 3D printers and many types of wearables, smart devices, etc.

What is an Arduino Made of?

If you take a look at an Arduino board, you will find that there are a number of small electronic components combined together in an ingenious way.

Here are some of the main components you’ll be interacting with on a standard Arduino board:

  • Connector pins
  • Power connector
  • Microcontroller
  • USB port

If you want to find out more about each of these parts, check out our post Parts of an Arduino Board.

How Do You Program an Arduino?

People working on Arduino usually use the official integrated development environment (image to the right), but recently they have released an online editor (image below). The official Arduino IDE is an open source software which was developed with Java and can be used on any operating system like Windows, Linux, MAC etc. The IDE allows you to program Arduino with syntax highlighting along with many other features that makes coding easier. Once your code is completed, just upload it to your Arduino board with the click of a button.

In short, Arduino is a fantastic foundation for any electronics based project because it gives you simple yet robust hardware in combination with an understandable and usable software, creating one of the most efficient and effective platforms for making ideas a reality.

~split~


What is Arduino?

What is Arduino Used For?

What is Arduino Board?