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Arduino for Arduinians by John Boxall 478 pages, paperback / digital ISBN 9781 7185 02789 Price: $95 RRP (paperback) $30 ~ 40 (digital) This book, subtitled “70 projects for the experienced programmer”, is aimed at those who are familiar with Arduino programming and want to learn some more advanced techniques. It doesn’t assume much electronics knowledge outside of programming, so it would be suitable for those who have dabbled in software but not much hardware. Book Review By Nicholas Vinen T his 478-page book is split into 24 chapters. Each chapter covers several projects, which may share some of the same hardware but demonstrate different principles. Each project demonstrates a particular technique, allowing you to build it yourself and experiment with it. You could also use the book as a reference to draw from when writing your own Arduino programs or designing hardware to interface to an Arduino module. Many of the chapters and techniques are things you will have seen in Silicon Chip magazine, although the book goes into much more detail on how the software works. Examples of techniques he describes that we’ve used recently include (these are not necessarily the exact chapter titles): • Chapter 5: Controlling LEDs with Charlieplexing • Chapter 11: Emulating USB mouses and keyboards • Chapter 13: Interfacing with PS/2 Keyboards • Chapter 14: Bluetooth serial communications using an HC-05 module • Chapter 21: Retrieving the current time from an Internet Time Server (NTP) • Chapter 24: Capturing images with an ESP32-CAM module He also shows how to ‘hack’ a commercial UHF remote-­controlled mains switch so it can be controlled by an Arduino. That is similar to how our November 2014 Programmable Mains Timer works. 86 Silicon Chip So, if you found the projects in which we used those techniques interesting and want to know more about how they work and how to implement them yourself, this book could be for you. Of course, the book covers more topics than just the ones I listed above. John starts with some fairly basic but useful demonstrations, such as how to sense multiple button presses using a single analog input (12 buttons in his demonstration), how to quickly change the state of multiple digital output pins at once, how to drive a seven-segment display and so on. Guided by an expert craftsman with over 30 years of experience, you’ll build 70 awesome Arduino projects and emerge a true Arduinian ready to invent your own complex creations. He explains concepts as basic as a voltage divider; as I implied earlier, the book seems aimed at those with some software experience but little hardware experience. Of course, if you already know those concepts, you can skip those sections. There’s still plenty of valuable demonstration code. More advanced concepts are covered later in the book, such as driving a graphical OLED display, creating a WiFi web server with an ESP32 module, having the Arduino control its own power supply, transferring data to and from USB flash drives, reducing Australia's electronics magazine siliconchip.com.au power consumption for battery-powered projects, interfacing with vehicle electronics via CAN bus, logging data to Google Sheets and more. I learned some things by reading this book. For example, I didn’t know about the TCA9548A I2C multiplexer, which seems like a handy little chip. I would also find it useful as a reference; for example, I could figure out how to read files from a USB flash drive if I had to, but it would save me time and effort to simply follow John Boxall’s examples in Chapter 12. One thing to note is that the photos throughout the book showing modules, components and his assembled PCBs are all in monochrome. The contrast is decent, so the subjects are readily visible. Still, it’s a pity that the ebook version doesn’t have colour photos, as the choice of monochrome was likely due to the cost of printing the physical edition. Building the projects Many of the projects are based on connecting prebuilt modules to the Arduino, which can usually be done quite easily with jumper wires or a breadboard. He provides some suggestions on places to buy those modules. Most of them are common and widely available. He also shows suitable breadboard layouts in many cases (where the circuits aren’t too complicated). Along the way, build fun and useful devices like: • A camera-enabled circuit to stream videos • An MP3 player to listen to audio • A CAN bus circuit which gathers speed and engine data from your car • A web server using an ESP32 board • A PS/2 keyboard In contrast, seven chapters require you to wire up many components to the Arduino (sometimes, the same circuit is used for multiple projects). He explains that you can wire those up manually on breadboard or protoboard, but as that would be a lot of work, he helpfully supplies PCB designs for seven of the more complex circuits. Interestingly, rather than sell the PCBs as we do for our projects, he has made the Gerber files for each design available, which are basically PCB blueprints. At the start of the book, he explains how to view those files and upload them to manufacturers to get the boards professionally made. He also suggests three possible manufacturers (including one of our advertisers, PCBWay). That is helpful if you have never used commercial PCB manufacturers before; the book goes into a fair bit of detail on how to get the boards made. However, to make things easier for readers of this book, John has agreed to let us sell a pack of the PCBs required to build the projects in his book (see the links at the end of this review). Conclusion I like the idea of this book because there are many people out there who are interested in tinkering with Arduino, perhaps coming from a background in computers or software, but who are relatively inexperienced when it comes to building actual hardware. It is ideal for people like that because of the way it explains the hardware concepts at a basic level and provides concrete examples. Also, despite going into some pretty advanced topics, the code is easy to understand, to the credit of both John and the Arduino developers. If you have some experience with Arduino but would not consider yourself an advanced Arduino programmer, this book is worth reading. Even relative beginners to Arduino should be able to get something out of it, as long as they are confident and willing to learn quickly and hone their skills. You can preview an entire chapter of the book (Chapter 8: Controlling High-Power Shift Registers) at https://nostarch.com/ arduino-arduinians A ZIP file at the bottom of that web page contains all the sample sketches and PCB design Gerber files. The book is available from numerous retailers for a bit over $60 for the printed edition ($95 RRP) or $30-40 for the ebook version (depending on platform etc). To order a copy or for more information, see www.penguin.com.au/books/ arduino-for-arduinians-9781718502789 Probably the best place to order the ebook version is the publisher’s website at https://nostarch.com/arduinoarduinians Similar books by John Boxall include Arduino Workshop (now in its second edition) and AVR Workshop. You can also find them via both the Penguin and No Starch web pages linked above. You can order the PCBs for building the projects in Arduino for Arduinians from our website at the following links: 1. Pack of six PCBs for Projects 3, 13, 14, 18, 19 and 26 for $20 + P&P: siliconchip.au/Shop/8/6903 2. The PCB for Project 27 for $7.50 each + P&P: siliconchip. au/Shop/8/6904 Note that P&P is per order, so you can order the six-PCB pack and one or more of the Project 27 PCB at the same time (and SC anything else from our Shop) and save on postage. Raspberry Pi Pico W BackPack The new Raspberry Pi Pico W provides WiFi functionality, adding to the long list of features. This easy-to-build device includes a 3.5-inch touchscreen LCD and is programmable in BASIC, C or MicroPython, making it a good general-purpose controller. This kit comes with everything needed to build a Pico W BackPack module, including components for the optional microSD card, IR receiver and stereo audio output. $85 + Postage ∎ Complete Kit (SC6625) siliconchip.com.au/Shop/20/6625 The circuit and assembly instructions were published in the January 2023 issue: siliconchip.au/Article/15616 siliconchip.com.au Australia's electronics magazine March 2024  87