How to use EAGLE CAD to create your own Arduino’s shield
Check out this Open Electronics article on working with EagleCAD to create Arduino shields recently shared via Hardware Makers, translated from the Italian version from Elettronica In N°164.
There are many CAD developed to assist the electronic designers during drawing of PCBs and schematics; often they are integrated in complete suite to project, simulate and realize a whole electronic system. Besides the many commercial versions, there are also free CADs available. Today we’d like to analyze one of the most diffused and known software: Eaglecad (eagle does not mean the powerful bird but it is the acronym of Easily Applicable Graphical Layout Editor) made by Cadsoft, actually at version 6.2.0. We have chosen this one because, as you know as an Arduino’s fan, the official pcbs and schematic files of the boards are developed and available free of charge to everybody in Eaglecad format; you can find also a lot of libraries and circuits made by famous DIY website (Sparkfun for first) available for free. Eaglecad is a professional software that have gained a lot of popularity due to the Arduino’s success.
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Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.
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