With this textbook you will learn the basics about computers, basic electronics, sensor and measurement technology and programming. We will also learn how to combine software and hardware and how we can communicate with the outside world using computer programs and create simple prototypes
A micro controller is an integrated circuit that is capable of running programs. There are many instances of those on the market today from a variety of manufacturers. The prices of these micro controllers keeps falling. In the hobbyist market, an open source architecture called "Arduino" that uses the Atmel range of processors has caught the imagination of countless folks. The boards containing these Atmel chips combined with a convention for connections and also a free set of development tools has lowered the entry point for playing with electronics to virtually nill. Unlike a PC, these processors are extremely low end with low amounts of ram and storage capabilities. They won't be replacing the desktop or laptop any time soon. For those who want more "oomph" in their processors, the folks over at Raspberry PI have developed a very cheap (~$45) board that is based on the ARM processors that has much more memory and uses micro SD for persistent data storage. These devices run a variant of the Linux operating system. I'm not going to talk further about the Raspberry PI as it is in the class of "computer" as opposed to microprocessor.
This is a step-by-step course to get you building cool Arduino projects even with no prior experience! This Arduino course is a compilation of 25 projects divided into 5 Modules that you can build by following clear step-by-step instructions with schematics and downloadable code. Click the figure below to check out the course.