Arduino: A Technical Reference

Chapter 1. The Arduino Family

This chapter provides a brief history of the Arduino, along with a terse genealogy of the various board types created since 2007. It doesn’t cover boards produced before 2007, nor does it attempt to be comprehensive in its coverage of the various clones and derivatives that have been produced. The main focus here is on the differences between the various primary types of Arduino boards, with a specific focus on the types of processors used and the physical design of the boards. It also takes a quick look at the range of possible applications for Arduino circuit boards.

Chapter 2 provides general information about the internal functions of the Atmel AVR processors, and Chapter 3 covers the specific processors used in Arduino boards. With the exception of the Yún, Chapter 4 describes the physical characteristics of different official Arduino boards introduced in this chapter.

A Brief History

In 2005, building upon the work of Hernando Barragán (creator of Wiring), Massimo Banzi and David Cuartielles created Arduino, an easy-to-use programmable device for interactive art design projects, at the Interaction Design Institute Ivrea in Ivrea, Italy. David Mellis developed the Arduino software, which was based on Wiring. Before long, Gianluca Martino and Tom Igoe joined the project, and the five are known as the original founders of Arduino. They wanted a device that was simple, easy to connect to various things (such as relays, motors, and sensors), and ...