Grab a Byte

In the Explore Learning portion of this unit, I learned how to program at a low level of program, using a restricted basis of movements. Initially the project started with using block code to familiarize students with the format. Gradually introduced were new blocks that were used, such as the "jump block", or the "pick up" block. I completed practice missions and training missions until I was introduced to the text based programming I was to use for the rest of the project. The text based format was designed better to optimize the code, as you could run many lines from block using just one or two lines by changing the number inside the brackets in the translate function to something more than one to move more than one square. You were also able to do things such as repeat more times than twice using a for loop. I completed those missions, and finished the entirety of the missions with 16% battery left.

Whilst doing the final missions, I found difficulty in counting the number of spaces for the rover to move, which resulted in many failures, up until my ultimate success. This was remedied through much trial and error, however it could've been easily avoided by doing these tasks in the training tab first, as the grid is still shown.

After I completed the Explore Learning, I moved onto learning TinkerCad circuits. These Circuits helped me in learning how to use a breadboard efficiently and use the breadboard to make components function. I began by completing some tutorials such as lighting up and LED, blinking an LED, and building a stoplight. I preferred to use the text coding here, despite using block for the early projects, because I had more control and it was more realistic to learn using text due to the application using Arduinos. The finished TinkerCad projects are shown below.

Next, I built the projects on a physical Arduino. To do this I grabbed a breadboard, an Arduino, some wires, a resistor, and some LEDs. I used similar wiring to the wiring I created in the TinkerCad portion of this project. I ensured that the LEDs were set with the positive and negative leg in the right spot. Then, once I had completed wiring everything, I simply copied the code I used in TinkerCad into the Arduino software, made sure the correct specs were in the program, verified the code, and imported it into the Arduino. The code worked, but there were two times when I had the LED wired wrong, the first instance, I misjudged which leg was positive, and the second time I placed the GND wire not connecting to the LED on accident. Overall this project was a success. The final Images and videos can be seen below. On the blinking LED, I wired pin 13 to the anode, then a resistor from the cathode's row to another row, and another linkage from there to ground. When I made the stoplight, I linked each anode to a different pin so they could be controlled separately. All the cathode's linked to one part on another side of the board, where a resistor linked that row and the - power rail. The negative power rail was also transferred to ground. I used the same exact methods for both these projects physically and digitally.