Controlling Motors, LED From Your Computer is no magic. It is very easy. You just need some piece of hardwares, a bit logic to code and obviously a computer. Computer does not mean only a desktop or a laptop, it can be a remote server, it can your Android Tablet with USB support, it can be an embedded device or system on chip. This is actually how we create robots, control spaceships. So, you can jokingly say, you will learn the rocket science with this Controlling Motors, LED From Your Computer guide.
Controlling Motors, LED From Your Computer : Basics of the basics
The basic reason behind this guide on Controlling Motors, LED From Your Computer is to make normal users aware that – recently there has been some business to push the products by giving some toy like guide to do basic things. It is obvious that, anyone will love to see the Christmas Tree’s lights can be controlled from a computer. It is a solid rip off because unless you know to code, these things becomes junks to any person’s home. They are basically copying codes and methods from various abandoned free blogs, old forum threads etc.
The extended usage of these method is Brain computer interfaces (BCI) where the commands to a computer is sent by using brain activity. As you can understand, a ‘middleman’ device is needed for creating the unidirectional path. These needs a Single-board microcontroller – a microcontroller built onto a single printed circuit board (PCB). Most are Open Source Hardware Project. We call these Wiring (development platform). Wiring hardware reference designs are under Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike 2.5 license. This Wiring originated from Processing (programming language). This Processing is an open source programming language and integrated development environment (IDE). If you do not know these things, you will end up with buying a set worth $100 and will play with 10 lines of code. Because do not know the GUI exists, the fun will be limited to Controlling Motors, LED From Your Computer. You can see the reference websites like :
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1 | http://www.processing.org/ |
They have computer software part, emulating the situation. For example this is the reverse :
1 | http://processing.org/learning/android/ |
Arduino is such an open-source electronics platform which basically make you to get fun with Controlling Motors, LED From Your Computer etc. The official website is this :
1 | http://arduino.cc/ |
For Arduino board you have buy this thing :
You have to install the software to run the code :
This are the basic things. For controlling a motor, you will need a motor, connectors, another board etc. The exact is true for LED lights.
Controlling Motors, LED From Your Computer : Making it Easy
What I wanted to say should be clear – if you can code yourself for a nice thing, or create something for your need then buying is successful. Controlling Motors, LED From Your Computer itself has no return after paying $100.
So, that board above connects to computer like any device like printer. There is that controller software like shown above. From that board, you have to add more things for more functions. So, Arduino is the project’s name, like WordPress is a blogging software project. You have to buy the things, with various available guides, not only Controlling Motors, LED From Your Computer, you can create a basic working robot :
1 | http://makeprojects.com/Project/Build+your+own+Arduino-Controlled+Robot!/577/1#.UMFPiCO530A |
Now coming to buying the boards and parts. The ready made board manufacturers know very well that, Controlling Motors, LED From Your Computer will be first and last project for over 50% buyers. They charge the double or more than if you assembled yourself :
1 | http://lifehacker.com/5909456/put-together-your-own-arduino-board-for-half-the-price-of-buying-one |
Audrino is very nice project, but be sure that you are not spending money for pre-written codes, parts as kits. It will basically become like buying a toy.
