Electronics and Programming Guides

September 01, 2022 (Last Updated: March 06, 2023) | Reading Time: About 1 minute

Discover helpful and inciteful tips that you can use in your electronics and programming projects. We are focused on home-brew electronics, specifically for home automation. We like to use MQTT, Home Assistant, Node-RED, and Zigbee along with Node MCU and Arduino. With this combination of electronics and programming, you can automate anything.

We share some information about electronics fundamentals as well as knowledge about more advanced topics in electronics. It is very helpful to learn fundamentals such as Ohm's Law and resister networks when you are building home automation circuits.

Here you can find guides and articles with creative ideas, tips, and advice about programming, electronics, and home automation.

When you mix programming and electronics together you get fun.

EFUNDIES.com currently provides articles and guides related to electronics and programming. When our site update is complete, we plan to offer source code collaboration. We will also be adding guides and articles about home automation, so check in often to see our new projects.

More from Efundies

This MIDI controller can be used to play music, write tracks in a DAW, or just about any home automation you can think of.

MIDI

You can use MIDI to write songs, play music, control games, or even control your home automations.

AVR chips come in many different sizes and shapes. Pictured is a PLCC socket.

AVR

The AVR microprocessor is the heart of most Arduinos. Instead of using the Arduino libraries, you can learn to program this chip directly with C++.

Save png

How to Save a PNG File in C#

This guide will walk you through the steps required to save an Image or Bitmap to disc in the PNG format and allow you to specify the compression quality.

How to Select the Right Resistor for Your Circuit: A Fundamentals Guide

The most important component to understand in electronics is the resistor.

AVR Port Input Logic

In this guide we will write a program in C that makes some decisions based on the state of input pins.

How to Lighten an Image in C#

In order to lighten an image in C# you need to look at each pixel one at a time and increase it's red, green, and blue values.

The newest addition to the Windows command prompt experience, Windows Terminal, is the best choice for most people.

Windows Command Prompt vs PowerShell

When it comes to comparing Windows Command Prompt and PowerShell, there are a few key differences.

C# Text File

There is a static object called "File" (located in System. IO) that does all the hard work for you.

If you have to move massive amounts of data, then you should be thinking about Robocopy and rsync.

How to Move Massive Amounts of Data Safely and Efficiently

If you're dealing with a large amount of data, you need to make sure you're moving it safely and efficiently. Here are some tips on how to do just that.

Here’s a closeup of how we wired our IRF520 modules. You can see that the power to the modules is in parallel.

MIDI Controlled Solenoids with Arduino and Ableton Live - Part 1

At the end of the series you will have a setup that is capable doing this. This is a pretty complex topic so it is split into 3 parts to make it easier to follow.

Docker is an essential service on your home automation server

Install Docker on Your Home Automation Server: 4 Different Ways

There are many different ways to install Docker for Home Automation. Let's talk about some of the ways that you can install Docker on your home automation server.

MIDI Controlled Solenoids with Arduino and Ableton Live - Part 2

This is part 2 in a 3 part series that shows how to make Ableton Live play music on electric solenoids using an Arduino.

AVR USART Serial

If you've been following along in these guides, then your STK500 should be setup like this. .

Introduction to the Command Line Interface: A Beginners Guide to Using the CLI

Introduction to the Command-Line Interface for Beginners

The command-line interface is a text-based interface that allows you to interact with your computer.

Home automation can be fun with Node-RED and Home Assistant

Node-RED Makes Automation With Home Assistant Fun

Node-RED adds a lot of fun to Home Assistant.

MQTT is the backbone of many home automation systems.

MQTT

MQTT is the backbone of many home automation systems. We consider MQTT to be the most important part of your home automation system.

Some common components include capacitors and resistors, as well as transistors, LED displays, and chips.

Electronics Fundamentals

Learn all about resistors, capacitors, and transistors in our collection of Electronics Fundamentals articles.

Begining Circuit Analysis and Ohms Law

For simple circuits this is pretty easy. For complex circuits it can be amazingly hard, even for pros.

How to Understand Electronics Signals and Flow for Beginners

Signals and Systems is a common term that is used to refer to system design.

You can see that the MIDI data generated in Ableton Live flows into the USB port of an Arduino, where it is used to control solenoids.

MIDI Controlled Solenoids with Arduino and Ableton Live - Part 3

This is the 3rd and final part in a 3 part series about how to control solenoids using Ableton Live and an Arduino.

Scale an Image in C# Preserving Aspect Ratio

If you need to change the size of an Image without changing the ratio of X to Y then this article tells you how.

AVR Port Output in C

Port output on an AVR microcontroller is very flexible. We show you how to configure each register.

Your home automation server can run many different operating systems, including Ubuntu, Proxmox, Unraid, and TrueNAS.

Unraid vs Proxmox vs Ubuntu - Battle For the Best Home Network Server OS

When it comes time to put an operating system on your home network server, you've got a few options.

What Is A Circuit

In general, you will hear the word used to describe what a schematic shows. Most projects are a circuit and most schematics are a circuit.

How To Read Schematics

Those pictures are called a schematic. A schematic is a picture representation of what we are talking about in electronics.

Electronics topics include chips, capacitors, resistors, transistors, and building circuit boards.

Electronics

Our collection of electronics articles helps you get started in home automation and circuit building.

Resistors in Parallel

Learn how to calculate the equivalent resistance of two resistors when they are wired in parallel.

AVR Port Input in C

### Connect PortB To Switches Remember how we connected **PORTA** to the **LEDS**. Now we are going to connect **PORTB** to the **SWITCHES**.

How to Darken an Image in C#

In order to darken an image in C# you need to look at each pixel one at a time and decrease it's red, green, and blue values.

C#: How to Use HTML Colors in Your Code

The .Net framework has a great object for dealing with colors called Color that we use to deal with HTML color codes.

RSR solderless breadboard

How to Prototype Electronics Projects

When experimenting with electronics, it is usually best to practice in what is called a Solderless Breadboard.

What is a binary program file

What is a Binary Program File

We cover what binary program files are and where you should put them on your computer

AVR microcontroler with printf function

AVR and printf

You should leave your STK500 setup exactly the same as it was setup for a previous guide.

Learning Linux will help you with many different home automation projects.

Linux

When you get interested in home automation, you are eventually going to want to learn Linux.

How to Read a Schematic - Common Schematic Symbols

There are about 10 that you should memorize, and the rest you can look up. Here we will show you some common schematic symbols and give a brief description of them.

How to Implement AVR Timer Interrupts in C for Atmel Microcontrollers

Timer interrupts are an excellent way of having your AVR do something at a given interval.

Mosquitto is one of the most popular open source MQTT brokers.

How To Set Up An MQTT Broker with Mosquitto

There are a few options to get your MQTT broker up and running, including Dockers and bare-metal installations. Let's talk about some of the most common ways to get your MQTT broker ready to go.

Personal binary executable directory

Make a Personal Binary Directory on Your Computer

If you want to keep your computer organized, it's a good idea to create a personal binary directory.

If you want to conIf you want to connect to your MQTT broker from the internet, then you need to forward a port in your router.

Connect to Your MQTT Broker from the Internet: Port Forwarding MQTT

If you want to connect to your MQTT broker from the internet, then you need to forward a port in your router

C# Switch

A switch statement in C# is a great way to switch between options.