BEGINNER TUTORIAL - Let's Make A Blink Blink!

In this tutorial, we’ll program an application for Blink that tells the piece to Blink. You should be able to follow the code line by line and hopefully learn a thing or two in the process. First things first, here’s the entire code for the application. We’ll go through this line by line down below!

    /*
     * Your very first Blinks application
     */
     
    Timer blinkTimer;
    bool isBlinkOn;
    
    void setup() {
      // this only happens once
      blinkTimer.set(500);
      isBlinkOn = false;
    }
    
    void loop() {
      // this happens ~30 times per second
      if(blinkTimer.isExpired()) {
        isBlinkOn = !isBlinkOn;
        blinkTimer.set(500);
      }
      
      if(isBlinkOn) {
        setColor(RED);
      }
      else {
        setColor(OFF);
      }
    }

You’ll want to start by creating your code environment with the following language.

    /*
     * Your very first Blinks application
     */
    void setup() {
      // this only happens once
    }
    
    void loop() {
      // this happens over and over again
      // the rate can be variable, but it will happen at 
      // a maximum the refresh rate of the display (~66Hz)
    }

After that, add your needed variables.

    Timer blinkTimer;
    bool isBlinkOn;

Then initialize those variables.

    void setup() {
      blinkTimer.set(500);
      isBlinkOn = false;
    }

If the time expires, update the status, on or off.

    void loop() {
      if(blinkTimer.isExpired()) {
        isBlinkOn = !isBlinkOn;
        blinkTimer.set(500);
      }
    }

Now set our display, should it be on or off?

    void loop() {
    ...
      if(isBlinkOn) {
        setColor(RED);
      }
      else {
        setColor(OFF);
      }
    }

That’s it! Take a look back at the entire code and see if you can work out how these items all work together!