Programming the MiniBee with Arduino
In this guide we will explain how you can use the Arduino IDE to program the MiniBees.
The MiniBee itself is a small form-factor Arduino board running at a clock speed of 12Mhz. When you buy a MiniBee, it is preprogrammed with the bootloader and the default MiniBee firmware sketch. The Sense/Stage system is designed so that you should rarely, if ever, need to reprogram your MiniBees, because all configuration is done via the XML configuration file in Pydon, or through OSC messages.
You will only need to program firmware yourself in case you need to update the firmware to a newer version, or when you need to modify the firmware to support specific sensors or do on-board data manipulations. For more information see the advanced guide on customizing firmware.
Summary
- Make a connection between the MiniBee and the coordinator board
- Prepare the Arduino IDE with firmware libraries and hardware definitions
- Uploading firmware to a MiniBee
- Programming the bootloader - in case you happen to have a MiniBee with no bootloader