Preface

Since the beginning of the 2000s, a global rekindled interest in hardware manufacturing occurred, due to many advances in engineering and microelectronics, which granted the proliferation of new kinds of inexpensive manufacturing tools. People of all ages, even children, started to convert their broken devices, old toys, and every unused piece of hardware, into new amazing objects. This unconventional approach to design and creating something new was characterized by a new way to express creativity, and this was the key factor that created the maker culture.

This was the maker revolution, a movement that changed our world radically. Open source projects provided all the required tools to unleash the creativity to build something, without the need for a strong knowledge in programming and engineering, nor a set of expensive components. Indeed, one of the most important successes achieved by the maker revolution was the capability to move prototypes manufacturing from small or big industries to our homes.

In February 2012, another open source project, called UDOO, started a prototyping board featuring Linux and Android operating systems, with the goal of combining the winning characteristics of Arduino and Raspberry Pi in one single board. After a year working on this project, in April 2013, the UDOO board joined the Kickstarter crowdfunding platform, and the feedback from the maker community was overwhelmingly positive—the project was funded in just 2 days.

Makers all over the world liked the project so much that they decided to contribute, not only through Kickstarter pledges, but even through useful ideas and advice during the board design phase. The result of the help provided by the maker community is a powerful prototyping board to build interactive and creative ideas we always wanted.

This book will teach you how to build your first hardware projects using the UDOO board as a fast prototyping tool. Starting with a simple application that involves the use of basic electronic components, you will work through different projects that let you build electronic circuits, with improved interactions and offered by the Android operating system.