Arduino is an open source, computer hardware and software company, project, and user community that designs and manufactures single-board microcontrollers and microcontroller
kits for building digital devices and interactive objects that can
sense and control objects in the physical world. The project's products
are distributed as open-source hardware and software, which are licensed under the GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL) or the GNU General Public License (GPL),[1]
permitting the manufacture of Arduino boards and software distribution
by anyone. Arduino boards are available commercially in preassembled
form, or as do-it-yourself kits.
Arduino board designs use a variety of microprocessors and controllers. The boards are equipped with sets of digital and analog input/output (I/O) pins that may be interfaced to various expansion boards (shields) and other circuits. The boards feature serial communications interfaces, including Universal Serial Bus
(USB) on some models, which are also used for loading programs from
personal computers. The microcontrollers are typically programmed using a
dialect of features from the programming languages C and C++. In addition to using traditional compiler toolchains, the Arduino project provides an integrated development environment (IDE) based on the Processing language project.
The Arduino project started in 2003 as a program for students at the Interaction Design Institute Ivrea in Ivrea, Italy,[2]
aiming to provide a low-cost and easy way for novices and professionals
to create devices that interact with their environment using sensors and actuators. Common examples of such devices intended for beginner hobbyists include simple robots, thermostats, and motion detectors.
The name Arduino comes from a bar in Ivrea, Italy, where some of the founders of the project used to meet. The bar was named after Arduin of Ivrea, who was the margrave of the March of Ivrea and King of Italy from 1002 to 1014.[3]
History
The origin of the Arduino project started at the Interaction Design Institute Ivrea (IDII) in Ivrea, Italy.[2] At that time, the students used a BASIC Stamp
microcontroller at a cost of $100, a considerable expense for many
students. In 2003 Hernando Barragán created the development platform Wiring as a Master's thesis project at IDII, under the supervision of Massimo Banzi and Casey Reas, who are known for work on the Processing
language. The project goal was to create simple, low cost tools for
creating digital projects by non-engineers. The Wiring platform
consisted of a printed circuit board (PCB) with an ATmega168 microcontroller, an IDE based on Processing and library functions to easily program the microcontroller.[4]
In 2003, Massimo Banzi, with David Mellis, another IDII student, and
David Cuartielles, added support for the cheaper ATmega8 microcontroller
to Wiring. But instead of continuing the work on Wiring, they copied
the Wiring source code and renamed it as a separate project, called
Arduino.[4]
The initial Arduino core team consisted of Massimo Banzi, David Cuartielles, Tom Igoe, Gianluca Martino, and David Mellis,[2] but Barragán was not invited to participate.[4]
Following the completion of the Wiring platform, lighter and less
expensive versions were distributed in the open-source community.[5]
Adafruit Industries,
a New York City supplier of Arduino boards, parts, and assemblies,
estimated in mid-2011 that over 300,000 official Arduinos had been
commercially produced,[6] and in 2013 that 700,000 official boards were in users' hands.[7]
Arduino is open-source hardware. The hardware reference designs are distributed under a Creative Commons
Attribution Share-Alike 2.5 license and are available on the Arduino
website. Layout and production files for some versions of the hardware
are also available. The source code for the IDE is released under the GNU General Public License, version 2.[8] Nevertheless, an official Bill of Materials of Arduino boards has never been released by Arduino staff.
Although the hardware and software designs are freely available under copyleft licenses, the developers have requested that the name Arduino be exclusive to the official product
and not be used for derived works without permission. The official
policy document on use of the Arduino name emphasizes that the project
is open to incorporating work by others into the official product.[9] Several Arduino-compatible products commercially released have avoided the project name by using various names ending in -duino.[10]
An early Arduino board[11] with an RS-232 serial
interface (upper left) and an Atmel ATmega8 microcontroller chip
(black, lower right); the 14 digital I/O pins are at the top, the 6
analog input pins at the lower right, and the power connector at the
lower left.
Most Arduino boards consist of an Atmel 8-bit AVR microcontroller (ATmega8, ATmega168, ATmega328, ATmega1280, ATmega2560) with varying amounts of flash memory, pins, and features.[12] The 32-bit Arduino Due, based on the Atmel SAM3X8E was introduced in 2012.[13]
The boards use single or double-row pins or female headers that
facilitate connections for programming and incorporation into other
circuits. These may connect with add-on modules termed shields. Multiple, and possibly stacked shields may be individually addressable via an I²C serial bus. Most boards include a 5 V linear regulator and a 16 MHz crystal oscillator or ceramic resonator.
Some designs, such as the LilyPad, run at 8 MHz and dispense with the
onboard voltage regulator due to specific form-factor restrictions.
Arduino microcontrollers are pre-programmed with a boot loader that simplifies uploading of programs to the on-chip flash memory. The default bootloader of the Aduino UNO is the optiboot bootloader.[14]
Boards are loaded with program code via a serial connection to another
computer. Some serial Arduino boards contain a level shifter circuit to
convert between RS-232 logic levels and transistor–transistor logic (TTL) level signals. Current Arduino boards are programmed via Universal Serial Bus (USB), implemented using USB-to-serial adapter chips such as the FTDI FT232. Some boards, such as later-model Uno boards, substitute the FTDI
chip with a separate AVR chip containing USB-to-serial firmware, which
is reprogrammable via its own ICSP header. Other variants, such as the
Arduino Mini and the unofficial Boarduino, use a detachable
USB-to-serial adapter board or cable, Bluetooth or other methods, when used with traditional microcontroller tools instead of the Arduino IDE, standard AVR in-system programming (ISP) programming is used.
An official Arduino Uno R2 with descriptions of the I/O locations
The Arduino board exposes most of the microcontroller's I/O pins for use by other circuits. The Diecimila,[a] Duemilanove,[b] and current Uno[c] provide 14 digital I/O pins, six of which can produce pulse-width modulated
signals, and six analog inputs, which can also be used as six digital
I/O pins. These pins are on the top of the board, via female 0.1-inch
(2.54 mm) headers. Several plug-in application shields are also
commercially available. The Arduino Nano, and Arduino-compatible Bare
Bones Board[15] and Boarduino[16] boards may provide male header pins on the underside of the board that can plug into solderless breadboards.
Many Arduino-compatible and Arduino-derived boards exist. Some are
functionally equivalent to an Arduino and can be used interchangeably.
Many enhance the basic Arduino by adding output drivers, often for use
in school-level education, to simplify making buggies and small robots.
Others are electrically equivalent but change the form factor, sometimes
retaining compatibility with shields, sometimes not. Some variants use
different processors, of varying compatibility.
Official boards
The original Arduino hardware was produced by the Italian company Smart Projects.[17] Some Arduino-branded boards have been designed by the American companies SparkFun Electronics and Adafruit Industries.[18] As of 2016, 17 versions of the Arduino hardware have been commercially produced.
0 Comments