What is Arduino?

Arduino platform offers open source hardware and software that is easy to use and is used widely for hobby projects and prototyping.

Open Source?

When it is said that Arduino is an open source platform, it means that all the information regarding the hardware and software that Arduino provides is freely available and can be used by anyone. They provide the designs for their hardware and software which can be used by anyone. Anyone can use these designs to manufacture the hardware and can distribute the software, no licenses are required.

Why Arduino?

Arduino provides many types of boards which are useful for various applications.

Arduino also provides its own IDE (Integrated Development Environment) which is free to download from Arduino’s website and use.

Many libraries are provided with the software and a large number of libraries developed by people from around the world are available for free. The functions implemented in these libraries can be used for quick development purposes.

This allows the user to use certain interfaces or modules without having in depth knowledge about the internal structure or working.

The point is that lack of technical or coding knowledge should not become an obstacle for development or creative thinking.

They also offer a number of expansion boards (or shields as they call them) which can be plugged into their boards and used.

All of these enable fast and easy development.

Arduino Boards

A wide range of boards is manufactured by Arduino. These have different sizes, different microcontrollers, and different processing capabilities.

There are entry level boards like the UNO, LEONARDO, NANO etc; boards with enhanced feature like the MEGA, PRO, ZERO etc; boards for Internet of Things like the YUN, TIAN etc; and wearable boards like the LILYPAD, GEMMA etc.

Depending on the need of application and the processing requirements, users can choose from any of these.

For more information about Arduino boards, click here.

Arduino IDE

The Arduino IDE is available for download for free on the Arduino website. You can download the latest version for your operating system from here.

Online IDE is also available. To use the online IDE, an account needs to be created on the Arduino website. For information on how to use the online IDE, click here.

The IDE makes it easy to write codes and upload the to the Arduino boards. It can be used with any Arduino board.