►
Description
Presented by Charlyn Gonda, Software Engineer (Uber).
Modern microcontrollers make it easy to bring your code out of the digital world and into the physical. Learn how any software engineer can get started with microcontroller programming, beginning with the Particle Photon board, a wifi-enabled microcontroller. You already know how to code. Now you just need a basic understanding of circuits and familiarity with the latest tools. Let’s pick up our soldering irons and put on safety goggles—it’s time to make things.
About GitHub Universe:
GitHub Universe is a two-day conference dedicated to the creativity and curiosity of the largest software community in the world. Sessions cover topics from team culture to open source software across industries and technologies.
For more information on GitHub Universe, check the website:
https://githubuniverse.com
A
Alright,
hey
everyone,
so
we're
gonna
get
to
know
each
other
a
little
bit
today.
So
if
you
would
humor
me
poor
first
time,
major
conference
speaker,
please
come
up
to
the
front
if
you're
all
the
way
to
the
back,
so
that
you
can
kind
of
feel
my
energy
and
then
I
can
feel
yours
only
if
you
feel
like
it,
but
it'll
be
it'll,
be
really
nice
that
way,
it'll
be
really
intimate
and
then
I
get
to
ask
you
some
questions
and
then
it'll
be
a
fun
session.
A
A
A
Okay,
perfect,
I'm,
glad
to
know
I'm,
not
alone
I.
Was
there
too
doing
anything
with
circuits
and
hardware
always
seemed
like
something:
I
could
not
do
when
I
was
a
kid.
I
would
take
toys
apart,
especially
the
ones
with
the
batteries
and
try
to
figure
out
how
they
worked,
but
I
would
never
be
able
to
put
them
back
together
and
my
mom
would
be
very
upset
and
apparently
moms
don't
take
photos
of
broken
toys,
so
I
have
a
stock
photo
to
show
you.
A
Instead
fast
forward,
I
went
to
a
university:
that's
separated,
CS
computer
science
from
CSE,
Computer,
Science
and
Engineering.
The
difference
was
the
requirement
of
several
hardware
and
Electronics
focus
classes
and
the
gloating
of
my
CSE
friends
that
what
they
were
doing
was
real
engineering.
I
was
very
interested,
but
then
I
remembered
all
of
my
broken
toys
and
all
of
the
failures
that
I've
had
as
a
kid
trying
to
put
them
back
together
and
I
decided
to
take
CS
instead
and,
of
course,
I
loved
programming.
A
A
This
was
my
first
failed
attempt
at
learning
anything
about
hardware
and
circuits.
The
idea
was:
does
anyone
here
play
ping-pong
table,
tennis,
ok,
great
I
do
not,
but
I
always
get
asked
to
keep
track
of
scores,
and
so
I
thought
well
what?
If
I
just
created
a
couple
buttons
one
for
each
team
and
they
could
keep
track
of
their
scores
themselves
and
then
he
would
update
a
live
scoreboard.
A
Despite
what
the
red
button
says,
it
was
not
easy.
I
had
no
one
to
guide
me
and
there
were
no
good
tutorials
around
that
I
could
find
and
plus
the
one
for
they
did
find
had
too
many
abbreviations,
G
and
E
VI
a
esp8266,
a
CI
I
mean
WT
us,
and
so
after
this
entire
debacle,
I
decided.
That
hardware
was
definitely
not
my
thing.
I
am
a
software
person,
that's
it.
I
set
my
dreams
aside
and
then
I
found
Twilio
signal
come
2017
s,
half
pack
v3,
it
is
their
badge
for
that
year.
A
It's
got
this
thing
called
a
particle
electron
on
it
and
it's
got
this
matrix
of
lights
and
you
can
text
stuff
to
it
and
it
does
things.
I
was
really
fascinated
that
somebody
wrote
some
poet
and
then
put
it
into
this
thing
and
I
was
literally
holding
it
in
my
hands
and
I
thought.
I
already
know
how
to
use
the
Twilio
API,
maybe
if
I
can
just
figure
out
how
they
made
this.
Despite
all
of
my
failures
and
all
of
my
broken
toys,
maybe
I
can
hold
my
code
too,
and
so
right
around
that
time.
A
A
One
I
want
to
teach
you
how
you
can
make
your
first
IOT
wearable,
and
the
hope
is
that
you
will
take
the
knowledge,
the
pieces
of
knowledge
that
you
gain
from
this
one
example
and
apply
it
to
your
other
projects.
Whatever
your
heart,
desires
and
number
two
I
want
to
remove
all
of
your
fear
and
hesitation
and
starting
a
hardware
project.
I
want
to
one
expand
your
problem-solving
tool
set
and
to
really
I
want
you
to
experience
how
fun
it
is
to
pull
your
code
out
of
the
screen
and
into
the
physical
world.
A
So
the
good
thing
is,
you
probably
already
live
and
breathe
the
Internet's
so
you're,
basically
halfway
there
I'm
here
to
talk
about
and
teach
you
the
of
things
parts
let's
get
started.
These
slides
are
going
to
live
here.
So
don't
worry
about
missing.
Anything
and
I
will
show
this
link
again
at
the
end
of
the
talk.
A
Okay,
first,
a
couple
of
quick
definitions:
a
microcontroller
is
basically
just
a
small,
tiny
computer.
It's
got
CPU,
it's
got
RAM,
it
runs
programs
and
maybe
it
connects
wirelessly.
So
it's
not
a
scary
thing
at
all.
It's
our
new,
happy
little
dancing
friend
and
for
the
duration
of
the
sock,
I
might
instead
of
saying
microcontrollers,
say
board,
because
microcontroller
is
kind
of
a
mouthful
and
at
some
point
I'm
going
to
talk
about
flashing
code.
That
just
means
the
act
of
putting
some
code
into
your
board.
A
The
general
idea
is
that
you
take
your
board,
you
flashed
some
code
into
it,
and
then
you
put
it
into
a
thing
that
you
want
to
control
and
appellant
depending
on
whatever
development
board
you
choose.
That
thing
could
either
be
directly
connected
to
the
Internet
via
some
cellular
connection,
or
it
connects
to
the
internet
via
Wi-Fi,
or
maybe
it
connects
to
other
things
as
well,
using
Bluetooth
or
mesh
technology,
etc.
And
then
maybe
you
use
some
kind
of
hub
to
connect
all
of
those
connected
things
to
the
Internet.
A
There
are
so
many
boards
to
choose
from
that
make
magazine
decided
to
create
an
entire
website
dedicated
to
helping
you
choose
your
board,
and
there
are
also
a
lot
of
programming
languages
to
choose
from
when
you
want
to
choose
a
board,
and
so
you
may
have
been.
You
may
be
familiar
with
Arduino
or
C++,
which
is
a
very
popular
flat
platform,
but
there's
also
boards
that
you
can
program
with
Python
and
they're
also
boards
that
you
can
program
with
JavaScript.
A
A
Sidenote
I,
don't
actually
work
for
a
particle
I.
Just
think
that
this
particular
family
of
microcontrollers
is
a
really
effective
gateway,
microcontroller
and
I.
Think
it'll
be
yours
as
well
and
another
side
note:
it's
got
a
cousin
called
the
particle
photon
and
it
connects
via
Wi-Fi,
but
you
can
use
both
the
code
that
we
will
be
talking
today
in
both
devices.
A
This
board
requires
no
downloads
because
it's
got
a
web
IDE
one
line
of
code
to
connect
to
the
internet,
and
there
are
no
cables
required
to
flash
your
code
interested.
Yet
it's
gonna
be
that
kind
of
presentation.
There's
a
lot
more
puppies
in
your
future.
Let's
get
started.
This
is
the
journey
that
we
will
take
today.
First,
for
the
first
few
sections,
we
will
talk
about
familiar
ground
which
is
coding.
First,
we
learn
about
that.
A
This
is
the
general
structure
of
the
code.
Anybody
here
familiar
with
OpenGL
or
processing
or
any
sort
of
animations
like
that,
yes,
okay,
fantastic,
then
this
will
be
kind
of
familiar
to
you
set
up
runs
once
in
the
beginning,
and
then
loop
runs
five
ever
so.
This
is
the
hello
world
example.
There
is
already
an
onboard
LED
on
the
board
itself
and
we
set
this
onboard
light
value
variable
to
point
to
where,
where
that
led
is
v7
and
then
in
setup,
firstly,
make
sure
to
set
d7
or
the
onboard
light
to
output
mode.
A
That
just
means
we're
going
to
output
some
voltage
into
this
pin
and
then
to
begin
with
we're
going
to
make
sure
that
the
LED
is
off
in
the
beginning,
and
then
it
will
enter
loop
and
it's
pretty
simple.
We
write
digital
high
digital
digital
writes
hi
to
turn
the
LED
on.
We
wait
one
second
and
then
digital
right
low
to
turn
the
LED
off,
and
then
we
wait
one
more
second
and
cetera
et
cetera
ad
infinitum,
and
that's
it
that's
the
holo
world
of
electronics.
A
Now
what?
If
we
wanted
to
turn
this
LED
on
and
off
using
the
Internet?
Well,
we
only
have
to
change
this
function
just
slightly.
First,
we
move
all
of
the
turning
on
and
off
logic
into
this
function
called
light
switch
which
accepts
a
string
command
when
that
command
is
on.
We
will
turn
the
LED
on
and
when
the
command
is
off,
we
will
turn
the
LED
off,
and
this
is
where
the
magic
comes
in
particle
dot
function.
This
is
your
one
line
of
code
to
connect
to
the
internet.
A
A
So
this
is
how
it
looks
like
if
I
go.
Argument
on
the
LED
turns
on
the
little
LED
and
if
I
go
off,
then
the
little
LED
goes
off
hurray.
We
just
made
a
thing
of
the
internet
or
have
we
well
I?
Guess
technically
we
did,
but
we
should
probably
figure
out
a
more
exciting
way,
a
more
exciting
thing
to
do,
rather
than
blinking
just
one
on
board
LED
on
and
off,
because
this
puppy
is
not
impressed.
A
This
is
the
first
component
that
I'm
gonna
tell
you
about
they're
called
neopixels
in
this.
They
are
from
this
company
called
Adafruit,
and
it's
actually
what
is
inside
that
shark
hat
that
I
just
showed
you
earlier.
These
are
individually
addressable,
RGB,
LEDs,
translation,
they're,
really
colorful
lights
that
you
can
treat
like
an
array.
A
So
here's
one
example
of
blinking,
just
one
pixel
on
the
neopixel
strip.
First,
we
call
set
picks,
look.
Excuse
me:
we
call
a
set
pixel
color
on
the
zero
index
and
then
we
pass
in
whatever
RGB
value,
and
then
we
call
strip
dot,
show
to
update
the
entire
strip
and
show
the
color,
and
then
we
delay
for
one
second
and
then
in
the
next.
Second,
we
call
set
pixel
color
again,
but
with
zero
zero
zero
as
an
RGB
value
which
turns
it
off,
and
then
we
show
and
then
we
delay
again
for
a
second.
A
So
that's
how
you
get
this
blinking
effect
and
then,
after
that,
if
you
want
to
blink
all
of
the
lights,
you
can
just
move
the
set
pixel
color
into
the
for
loop
into
a
for
loop.
That
goes
through
all
of
your
pixels
and
then
sets
the
color
and
then
shows
it
and
and
do
the
same
thing
for
turning
it
off
and
my
favorite.
A
Now,
let's
talk
about
a
different
component
just
for
fun,
these
are
called
servos,
they're
servos,
not
server,
I,
always
get
that
mixed
up.
They
move
their
motors
and
they
move
to
the
angle
that
you
specified.
So
you
just
give
it
an
angle
and
then
it
moves
to
that
position,
and
this
is
an
example
of
how
it
looks
like
this
is
an
audience
quality
meter
and
it
looks
like
you
are
doing
amazing,
congratulations
and
it's
the
same
kind
of
idea.
A
A
So
after
you
learn
about
all
of
these
code
components,
then
the
rest
of
it
becomes
kind
of
stuff
that
you
already
know.
For
example,
you
can
make
an
event
receiver
server
that
receives
events
via
web
hooks
from
the
uber
API
and
then
update
your
project
accordingly,
with
a
correct
string
argument
to
trigger
the
correct
animation
or
you
can
create
an
event
polling
server
and
that
server
might
pull
the
Twitter
API
to
search
for
a
particular
hashtag.
A
And
then
you
update
your
project
again
or
you
can
create
a
google
voice
command
that
and
then
set
up
your
own
dialogue
flow
instance
and
then
also
turn
on
your
project.
You
get
the
idea.
This
is
stuff
that
you
already
know
like
I
said
earlier.
You
are
already
halfway
there.
Oops
don't
want
to.
Let
you
miss
that
puppy
hooey,
we
are
almost.
We
are
kind
of
like
this
puppy
right
now
we're
almost
out
of
the
bowl.
A
A
A
We'll
dive
a
little
bit
deeper
into
this
section,
because
this
might
be
the
the
knowledge
that's
a
little
bit
more
similar
to
those
in
the
room.
So
here's
some
extra
puppies
for
encouragement,
I
hope
you're,
not
desensitized,
yet,
alright.
Let's
do
it
all
right.
First,
you
take
your
board
and
then
you
flip
it
to
the
side
like
this
you'll
notice
that
there's
a
bunch
of
pins
sticking
out
on
the
side,
and
these
are
basically
you
can
kind
of
think
of
them
as
ports
on
your
computer.
A
They
allow
you
to
connect
peripheral
devices
to
your
the
board
itself,
such
as
the
servo
or
the
neopixels
they're
called
pins,
and
each
pin
has
a
specific
purpose.
It's
it's
got
a
specific
purpose
and
you
will
find
out
what
our
purposes
in
this
pinout
diagram
now
don't
worry.
I
know
that
this
pin
out
diagram
is
kind
of
really
dense
and
really
scary,
but
there's
actually
a
only
a
couple
of
things
that
you
need
to
know
to
get
started
number
one.
There's
always
going
to
be
a
way
to
power.
A
The
microcontroller
give
power
to
the
board
and
number
two
there's
going
to
be
a
way
to
get
data
out
of
the
microcontroller
and
data
into
the
microcontroller.
So
you
would
get
data
out
of
it
if
you
wanted
to
display
something
like
trigger
movement
or
lights,
and
you
would
get
data
into
it
if
you
were
trying
to
sense
anything
from
the
environment,
let
me
give
you
some
tips
on
how
to
sort
of
navigate
your
way
around
this
you'll
notice
that
there
are
pins
that
contain
that
start
with
the
letter
D.
A
That
typically
means
that
it
is
a
data
pin
and
each
data
pin
has
like
different
capabilities
as
well,
and
that
will
depend
on
the
component
that
you're
connecting
to
it.
But
this
is
a
good
place
to
start,
and
then
there
will
also
be
a
way
to
power.
Your
microcontroller,
and
usually
you
will
have
a
lot
of
development
boards.
A
microUSB
is
what
you
would
use
to
power
it,
but
there's
also
this
thing
called
a
jst
connector
and
that
stands
for
Japan
solderless
terminal.
But
you
don't
really
need
to
know
that.
A
The
thing
that
you
need
to
know
is
that
it's
a
typically
it's
a
typical
connector,
usually
for
batteries,
to
connect
wires
together
and
then,
if
you
wanted
to
go
a
little
bit
more
pro,
you
can
find.
You
can
usually
find
a
VIN
VI
n,
which
stands
for
voltage
in
I,
believe
and
then
G
and
E,
which
is
ground,
which
you
need
to
get
power
to
flow
through
your
entire
circuit.
But
if
you're
just
started,
you
should
probably
use
a
JSC
or
the
USB
port
to
power.
A
A
Ok,
so
this
is
an
example.
These
are
the
neopixel
sticks
that
are
inside
the
shark
neck
or
hat,
and
one
of
them
is
facing
front,
and
one
of
them
is
facing
the
back
so
that
we
can
see
the
pads
behind
it
and
then,
if
we
zoom
enhance
and
rotates,
we
can
see
that
there
is
a
ground
connection.
There
is
a
power
connection
denoted
by
five
VDC,
which
means
that
this
component
needs
five
volts
to
operate,
and
then
there's
also
a
data
in
pad
connection,
and
so
you
can
kind
of
see
where
we're
going
with
this.
A
A
A
This
breadboard
is
a
tool
to
connect
different
components
of
your
circuit
together
temporarily,
so
that
you
can
test
that
your
circuit
is
working
fine,
that
electricity
is
flowing
through
it
and
that
your
hardware,
as
well
as
your
code,
is
doing
what
you
expect.
Does
that
sound
familiar?
Doesn't
that
sound
like
a
staging
environment?
A
So
this
is
basically
your
Hardware
staging
environment
and
you
will
typically
look
at
a
circuit
diagram
or
make
a
circuit
diagram
to
sort
of
communicate
where
these
connections,
how
these
connections
should
work
and
you'll,
probably
want
to
take
a
look
at
this
closer
a
little
after.
So
this
is
how
it's
gonna
work.
A
First,
you
take
your
breadboard
and
then
you
connect
your
board,
your
microcontroller
to
it,
and
then
you
take
the
thing
that
you
want
to
connect
to
your
breadboard
and
notice
that
I've
soldered
some
wires
onto
this,
so
we
can
actually
use
it
with
a
breadboard.
First,
you
connect
ground.
It's
always
important
to
connect
round.
First,
ask
me
how
I
know
and
then,
when
you
connect
round
we're
gonna
use
this
ground
rail
at
the
bottom.
A
We
connect
it
to
power
as
well,
and
then
we
take
our
battery
and
we
first
take
round
first
connect
it
there
and
then
connect
the
power
wire
on
to
the
circuit
and
as
soon
as
you
connect
that
power
wire
that
entire
thing
lights
up,
you
see
that
the
microcontroller
itself
is
lit
up
and
we
are
ready
to
test
our
circuit
and
our
code
itself.
So
at
this
point
you
can
actually
make
that
curl
request
or,
if
you're
already
integrated,
that
HTTP
request
to
your
app.
A
A
Alright,
now
that
we
know
how
to
connect
it
in
the
breadboard,
we
probably
need
to
you'd
probably
want
to
transfer
it
to
a
thing
that
will
allow
you
to
sort
of
carry
it
around
and
make
these
circuit
connections
more
permanent.
And
that's
where
this
proto
board
comes
in
it's
it's
kind
of
like
your
production,
environment,
I
guess
you'll
be
able
to
make
your
circuit
connections
or
solder
together
your
circuit
connections,
so
you
can
carry
around
and
show
people
and
in
this
photo
I'm
using
headers.
A
Once
upon
a
time,
I
forgot
that
headers
existed
and
then
I
just
destroyed
my
microcontroller.
So
don't
forget,
headers
exist
and
this
kind
of
functions
like
like
a
breadboard.
So
it's
got
holes
in
it
and
all
of
the
pins
are
lying
to
those
holes.
And
then,
after
that,
you
just
transfer
all
of
the
circuits
that
you
did
from
the
breadboard
to
this
proto
board.
And
then
you
can
test
again
because
you
want
to
keep
that
feedback
of
testing
your
code
and
your
hardware
pretty
tight
so
that
you
can
catch
any
errors
along
the
way.
A
And
then,
after
that,
you
just
make
a
make
a
shark
hat
or
buy
a
shark
at
in
this
case
three
pints
of
unicorn
horn
and
then
build
them
all
together
and
that's
it
folks.
You
have
just
learned
how
to
create
a
thing
of
the
Internet's
I
will
let
you
enjoy
your
newfound
knowledge
for
a
little
bit
while
I
drink
this
water
and
you
can
enjoy
these
puppies.
A
So,
like
I
mentioned
earlier,
this
project
really
allowed
me
to
learn
a
bunch
of
things
about
making
hardware
and
making
hardware
projects
and
have
kind
of
been
addicted
to
making
things.
Since
then,
for
example,
for
my
birthday,
I
made
this
birthday
mail
box
printer
and
it
printed
out
tweets
and
Facebook
messages
for
my
birthday.
I
also
live
streamed.
It
and
my
friends
really
got
a
kick
out
of
seeing
their
digital
notes
turn
into
physical
ones.
A
And
then,
a
couple
weeks
ago,
I
lost
my
clicker
before
this
presentation
and
so
I
made
my
own
I
3d
printed.
The
case
I
put
my
name
on
it
and
this
microcontroller
is
built
with
JavaScript,
so
it's
programmed
with
JavaScript.
So
it's
a
really
cute
little
controller,
and
my
latest
project
involves
this.
Anyone
familiar
with
bongo
cat.
A
Yes,
I
got
some
Bongo
cat
people,
okay,
so
this
is
a
meme,
that's
been
pretty
popular
on
Twitter,
or
maybe
it's
not
anymore,
I,
don't
know
and
I
turned
it
into
this
robot
plush.
So
first
I
reacted
to
sound
and
then
I
made.
It
reacts
to
any
Twitter
post
that
contains
hashtag
Bongo
cat
and
I.
Have
it
right
here.
A
Enjoy
making
these
projects
so
much
that
I
was
able
to
hold
a
workshop,
where
I
was
able
to
teach
my
fellow
software
engineers
how
they
could
they
also
could
program
circuits
and
make
their
own
wearable
devices
and
and
solder
wires
together.
It
was
really
fun
here
is
a
preview
of
the
kits
that
I
made
for
this
workshop
and,
as
you
can
see,
I
had
way
too
much
fun
packaging
them
together,
and
this
is
the
wonderful
hat
zoo
that
came
out
of
that
workshop.
A
It
was
super
satisfying
to
see
the
smiles
of
my
friends
faces
and
to
know
that
they,
too
have
been
inspired
to
make
their
own
projects
and
so
to
close
up.
I
will
leave
you
with
this.
Ask
software
engineers.
We
are
problem
solvers.
In
fact,
we
are
professional
problem
solvers.
This
is
what
we
do
and
if
we
all
expanded
our
collective
tool
sets
I
think
we
would
unlock
some
great
solutions
and,
let's
not
forget
we're
all
creative
builders
as
programmers.
A
We
have
control
of
most
things
inside
of
our
screen,
but
there's
so
much
possibility
and
so
much
opportunity
here
to
bring
your
code
from
behind
your
screen
to
beyond
it
and
so
much
opportunity
to
bring
delight
and
joy
to
people
through
your
code.
I
hope
that
our
time
today
has
convinced
you
to
go
out
there
and
make
some
people
smile
and
make
some
code
you
can
hold
thanks.