Thursday, April 15, 2010

Spring Cleaning, Part 2: The “Start Here” Page

Over the past several months, I’ve received quite a few questions on getting started with the Arduino and TouchShield Slide (Matt also did a nice summary last week), and some of the other hardware over at the Liquidware shop. So the next project on my list was to create a single, central place for folks to get started…

image

Whenever I bought hardware in the past, I would do one of two things: a) rely on my intuition to figure it all out, or b) look for a quick start guide to get me going.

Option A only worked about 35% of the time for me, but I suspect that most DIYers actually fare rather well with it, and perhaps it works 60 or 70% of the time.

Even so, Option B was never a bad thing to have. It was with that concept in mind that Matt and I wrote up the Sensor Cheatsheets. But from a ground level, something was still missing. In other words, if I had no idea what kind of hardware I just picked up, what do I do?

Besides telling people to give me a call, or send me a note, there’s now the Liquidware “Start” page, aptly located at:

www.liquidware.com/start

I’ve compiled the latest software and hardware links, and included three sets of instructions for the most common things people ask me after they’ve bought their Portable MegaPalm or Starter Kits:

-How do I use Arduino with these shields and sensors?
-How do I program the TouchShield Slide?
-How do I upload images to the Slide?

There are no frills on this page, just steps and links to get from point A to point B. I’ll be updating it as the questions change, or as I add new features, and I’m hoping it will be a good roadmap for how to get going with new hardware, software, and resources :)

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