The Arduino Inventor's Guide Read Online Free PDF

). You’ll be asked whether you’d like to make a contribution; the development and maintenance of the Arduino IDE rely on the help and contributions of the community that uses it.
    NOTE
    If you’ve already plugged in your board, that’s not a problem—you may just need to restart your computer after the installation is complete for the drivers to work properly.
    FIGURE 1-4: You can use the online IDE or download the latest version for your operating system.

    Even if you already have the IDE installed, we recommend downloading and installing the latest version. The Arduino IDE is continuously being updated and improved, and it’s best to have the newest release. The examples in this book use IDE versions 1.8.1 and later.
    NOTE
    If you like to be on the bleeding edge of software, the Arduino Downloads page also provides nightly builds that preview the next release. For this book, however, we recommend using the latest stable release.
    The Arduino website also provides an online platform called Arduino Create, which includes a web-based code editor. It allows you to program your device through your web browser and share and view projects with others online. As of the writing of this book, it is supported only on Windows and OS X.
    Whether you choose to use Arduino Create or the downloaded IDE, follow the directions online to run the installation process.
Installing on Windows
    If you’re working on a Windows PC, we recommend downloading the Windows Installer version of Arduino. Download this file, open it, and click Run . This will bring up the Installation Options dialog ( Figure 1-5 ).
    FIGURE 1-5: Installation Options dialog for Arduino. Make sure that USB drivers are selected!

    Check the Install Arduino software box along with the other options, or you’ll have to install the drivers separately. Then, tell the installer where you’d like to install Arduino (we recommend accepting the default directory), and click Install .
    Once you begin the installation process, have a snack or a cup of coffee, because it could take a few minutes to complete. Depending on your version of Windows, you might again be asked if you want to install drivers and if Arduino LLC is trusted, as pictured in Figure 1-6 .
    FIGURE 1-6: In Arduino we trust!

    If you don’t want to see prompts like this again, check the box that says you trust Arduino. Either way, click Install to install the USB drivers. That’s it! Arduino typically installs a shortcut on your desktop. Double-click that now to run the Arduino IDE.
Installing on OS X
    If you’re using a Mac, download the Arduino IDE option for OS X, and follow the directions in this section.
Installing the IDE
    After the download is complete, hover your cursor over your
Downloads
folder, and click Open in Finder as shown in Figure 1-7 .
    FIGURE 1-7: After downloading, the program will be in the
Downloads
folder. Click Open in Finder to move it into the
Applications
folder.

    Then, simply click and drag the
Arduino
program file into the
Applications
folder, as shown in Figure 1-8 . In most cases, you won’t need to install anything else, and you should be able to open the Arduino IDE as you would any other program.
    FIGURE 1-8: Click and drag the
Arduino
file into the
Applications
folder on the left.

Installing the FTDI Driver Manually on OS X
    If you’re using a standard Arduino Uno board, the drivers should be preinstalled and work out of the box. If you’re using the SparkFun RedBoard, there’s one extra step needed to manually install a driver. The SparkFun RedBoard uses a USB chip from Future Technology Devices International (FTDI) to communicate with your computer. You need to manually install the FTDI driver for this chip. First, navigate to
http://www.sparkfun.com/ftdi/
. This will take you to our tutorial on installing FTDI drivers (see Figure 1-9 ).
    Click the link for Mac OS X. This will direct you to options for a driver to install based on the version of OS X running on