The "Hello World!" of Physical Computing
The first program every programmer learns consists in writing enough code to make their code show the sentence "Hello World!" on a screen.
As a microcontroller, Arduino doesn't have any pre-established output devices. Willing to provide newcomers with some help while debugging programs, we propose the use of one of the board's pins plugging a LED that we will make blink indicating the right functionallity of the program.
We have added a 1K resistor to pin 13, what allows the immediate connection of a LED between that pin and ground.
LEDs have polarity, which means they will only light up if you orient the legs properly. The long leg is typically positive, and should connect to pin 13. The short leg connects to GND; the bulb of the LED will also typically have a flat edge on this side. If the LED doesn't light up, trying reversing the legs (you won't hurt the LED if you plug it in backwards for a short period of time).
Code
The example code is very simple, credits are to be found in the comments.
Blink
Turns on an LED on for one second, then off for one second, repeatedly.
Most Arduinos have an on-board LED you can control. On the UNO, MEGA and ZERO
it is attached to digital pin 13, on MKR1000 on pin 6. LED_BUILTIN is set to
the correct LED pin independent of which board is used.
If you want to know what pin the on-board LED is connected to on your Arduino model, check
the Technical Specs of your board at https://www.arduino.cc/en/Main/Products
This example code is in the public domain
*/
// the setup function runs once when you press reset or power the board
void setup() {
// initialize digital pin LED_BUILTIN as an output.
pinMode(LED_BUILTIN, OUTPUT);
}
// the loop function runs over and over again forever
void loop() {
digitalWrite(LED_BUILTIN, HIGH); // turn the LED on (HIGH is the voltage level)
delay(1000); // wait for a second
digitalWrite(LED_BUILTIN, LOW); // turn the LED off by making the voltage LOW
delay(1000); // wait for a second
}