I highly recommend the Forrest Mims books for a great introduction to electronics that eases the learning curve for a beginner. His “Getting Started in Electronics” is a classic that used to be sold at Radio Shack back in the day. Now on Amazon.
Love me some Forrest Mims. I will never desert my childhood electronics icon. But I also want to make it easier to create complicated circuits. Trying to make a complicated circuit with analog components and discrete logic chips, a la 1977, is hard. I lose track of where the signal is going and how it is being manipulated. I am hoping that the Arduino will let me just arbitrarily program exactly what I want the circuit to do into one, universal device. We shall see.
With the UNO, or any other controller board, although most pins can be used as inputs/ outputs, some pins are specific. So if you need analog to digital conversion for say a potentiometer knob or to read a temperature from a thermistor, don't previously commit all the A-D inputs as digital input/outputs just because it seemed easier to run the wires to that side of the board.
This could be a very slippery slope! Arduinos can be very addictive.
I have plenty (I mean plenty) of books on it, what happens usually is I start trying to figure out how to do what I want (eg get a battery that works with my Eggtimer) then get confused and dive into a rabbit hole (eg how do I charge this thing) and it takes me twice the amount of time as I should (eg 3 weeks). Also I really don’t understand data connections and stay 6 feet away from them at all times.
Me too! All the beginner info I can find tells how components work, what they do, what effect they have on voltage/current, maybe how to test them and some simple circuit that uses them.
Try
Forrest is still kicking at a ripe old age! Www.forrestmims.org
This is a full set of Arduino tutorials aimed at absolute beginners. Total of 68 videos but you don't have to watch them all
I need to find out what a TV typewriter is!
I think that’s called a keyboard
I think that’s called a keyboard
No, the TV typewriter is the DISPLAY electronics. Same as what is now called a Video controller.I think that’s called a keyboard
haha
I enjoyed Don Lancaster’s articles in Nuts and Volts magazine. RIP Mr. Lancaster.
I know most of the analog electronics I need for my humble projects. The “open collector” output of the LM311 comparator stymied me for awhile. My brain said, “output pin, so it must be sourcing current”. Nope, the pin is “sinking” current through a transistor built right into the chip. And the output pin needs a “pull up” resistor to the power rail. So, even if I learn the Arduino, I still need to understand how the analog critters the Arduino is connected to work.Although the software makes things easier in a way, it also has it's little bumps:
The last doesn't cover hobbying of course - it's for commercial deployment.
- (-) You have to learn software
- (?) People like my brother, who's computer science, are deciding how things "should" work
- (+) You mostly don't have to bother much with electronics.
- The processor is essentially a wide range PLC so you just hook up based on the input or output specs.
- Lots of plant techs do this: "oh, it requires a 24VDC input from the sensor - program High and Low Value state(-)
- (-) Sometimes the software can make a hardware fault obscure and result in replacing more and larger assemblies.
- (+/-) You can often program around a fault - depends.
In the end I would think that having the solid Analog knowledge + the processor will equal good, well written programs since you'll know the peripherals, servos, and the processor.
Cheers / Robert
Arduino output pins are configurable! Can source or sink, pull ups and pull downs internally.
It blinks! The "L" LED built into the Uno R3 blinks! And I made it blink faster! It was blinking at .5 hertz. Now it is blinking at 1 hertz!
The Tandy Color Computer had a tape drive if I remember correctly. I forget how much RAM it had. My buddy got one for Christmas and programmed it draw a circle on his color TV. It was so awesome!
2650 was a copy of IBM 1130 architecture. Weird!
