Many microcontroller learners struggle to grasp the essentials, going from high enthusiasm at the start of their studies to frustration and giving up, leading to a love-hate relationship with microcontrollers. Among discussions with classmates at work and school, the most common phrase heard is, “Microcontrollers are too difficult.”
In fact, it’s not that microcontrollers are hard to learn; it’s that many don’t know how to get started. Remember this: “Microcontrollers are not learned; they are played with.”
Learning microcontrollers requires more than just reading books; practical experience must start from the actual needs. Today’s technology is highly modular, and everything can be modularized. However, in the end, technicians often become mere users. The foundational knowledge left by predecessors is still crucial to know. After all, the ultimate goal of learning microcontrollers is development, to create intelligent control devices that reflect one’s value.
There are two methods for practical learning. One method is to purchase a 51 microcontroller experiment board. It doesn’t need to have too many functions; for beginners, a board with excessive features is overwhelming, often filled with components that may never be used. Some experiment boards are designed to add features while lowering costs, using surface mount components and double-sided wiring, making them overly complex. It seems as if the designers thought that learning microcontrollers was just about following their prompts to download programs. Many beginners finish their studies thinking that microcontrollers are not just chips but the standalone systems often mentioned in old textbooks.
I believe that a few modules are sufficient for beginners learning microcontrollers; the rest must be developed independently. Basic projects like LED chasers, seven-segment displays, keypads, buzzers, serial communication, and AD conversions are about enough. If you can skillfully apply these, you can say you have entered the world of microcontroller hardware. The remaining task is to practice designing circuits and continuously accumulate experience.
When designing circuits, it’s essential to learn PCB design software, as modern development requires computer-aided design for mass production; manual methods are too inefficient. However, during the learning process, it’s advisable to solder by hand.
Before soldering, ensure you understand the circuit connections. You can find many circuit diagrams online, but not all are usable, so it’s recommended to keep a breadboard handy. With it, you can test your circuits before soldering. If the tests on the breadboard are successful, the subsequent soldering will likely succeed; if not, you can simply try again. Once you pass the first hurdle, the rest will be easier; starting is always the hardest part.
The second method: If you have someone nearby who is a beginner with microcontrollers and has good hands-on skills, ask them for help in setting up a simple microcontroller minimum circuit, even if it’s just to control an LED. For them, creating a minimum system board is a piece of cake, while it’s much more challenging for beginners. Once that barrier is broken, everything else becomes simpler.
Only by understanding the hardware can you use it proficiently.
Only by knowing how programs are downloaded into the microcontroller can you understand why writing microcontroller programs is necessary; this motivation comes from a solid foundation. Programming microcontrollers is like conversing with them. If you don’t know who you’re talking to or if they’re listening, will you still have the enthusiasm to communicate? Of course, if there’s no one to help, then follow the advice: find several minimum circuit diagrams online and solder them on a breadboard. If you can’t do that either, it’s suggested that you buy an experiment board, which will be useful for future microcontroller learning and project testing.
Once you have the microcontroller experiment board, practice as much as possible. Ideally, have a computer at hand, download fewer movies, connect the experiment board to your computer, install the necessary software, download reference programs, and modify them, starting with the simplest traffic light experiment. Once you find that you can control the traffic light and understand the software and hardware design involved, it indicates that you have entered the field. You will discover how charming microcontrollers are; this is not just about learning knowledge but enhancing your own value.
With such wide applications, traffic design is just the beginning. You will no longer feel that you haven’t learned anything or that you are incapable. You will utilize knowledge from computer programming and electronic technology. When the program you wrote performs as you intended, you will feel happier than doing anything else; that sense of achievement and fulfillment from learning is rare. Then make the seven-segment display light up with the number you need. Once you master these two parts, you will find it hard to resist the urge to consider which career path to take.
As you learn, you will certainly encounter many problems while writing programs. At that point, you can refer back to the books you studied before, including programming books and digital/analog electronics books. You will find that the knowledge you learned previously is still useful.
When you encounter something you don’t understand, revisiting old materials to check is the essence of the saying, “Reviewing the old to learn the new can be a teacher.” Knowledge must be applied to real life to solve practical problems. Use microcontrollers to design simple home appliance timers or infrared remote controls to unleash their potential. Think about it: after so many years of university, exploring for so long, hesitating and lingering, attending classes daily, what have you learned? Did you study just to get a 60 on the final exam, feeling lucky to score 90, and then bragging about how well you learned your major knowledge, unaware that university exams are not like high school exams? What does it matter if you got a scholarship? But when you return to school next semester, you might find that all the knowledge has faded away. What did you actually learn?
Why recommend learning microcontrollers? Because microcontrollers are essential for engineering students, integrating computer programming, electronic technology, and multiple control languages into one discipline. Rather than saying you are learning microcontrollers, it’s more accurate to say you are studying a comprehensive field.
The question of whether to learn assembly programming or C language programming troubles many people. This issue likely arises from school teaching and some textbooks’ educational guidance. In the first year, students are introduced to C language programming, and before they even grasp its practical uses, other languages come rushing in. Even when a dedicated microcontroller course begins, the content resembles technical documentation, with many instructions but few complete examples, leaving students unsure of why they are learning programming.
Many students start with C language courses in their first year; I attended one too, but back then, it was just multiplying and adding numbers, calculating factorials, and using C language to solve elementary math problems. We had two lab sessions a week, constantly typing away at the textbooks, yet after class, I still didn’t know what I had mastered or its practical applications. What’s the use of what I learned? If an interviewer asks if you have programming experience, what comes to mind? “C language, VC, VB, many languages; C language is fundamental, engineering-oriented, and VC is advanced and object-oriented.” But when asked if you can apply what you learned in C language to real-world scenarios, like designing a timer alarm in C language, you would be stumped because you never learned that in school.
Microcontroller programming can be done in either C or assembly language, but I recommend C language for its modular management and strong portability, making it suitable for writing large programs. If you have a foundation in C language, learning will be easier; if not, you can learn C language while studying microcontrollers.
While many start with assembly language when approaching microcontrollers, writing small assembly programs is relatively simple. However, implementing algorithms can complicate things. Although C language code is generally longer than assembly code after compilation and its execution efficiency is lower, previously, due to chip manufacturing limitations and microcontroller clock frequency constraints, many microcontrollers had minimal internal memory and low frequencies. But that’s not the case anymore; the internal memory of chips is no longer affected by these differences.
Does this mean assembly language should be ignored? Not at all. It is essential to learn assembly language for two reasons: first, when starting with microcontrollers, assembly language has simple syntax. Second, if you aspire to become an advanced microcontroller programmer, mastery of assembly language is crucial, as many advanced microcontrollers like ARM use assembly language as their boot code. Additionally, many newly released microcontrollers first have assembly language compilers before C language compilers are developed.
Therefore, for microcontroller learning, start with assembly language, master C language, and then deepen your understanding of assembly language. Finally, for microcontroller studies, the priority is to get started. Once you have a foundation, pay attention to the market and what companies need. I believe that after gaining a foundation, understanding what type of microcontroller skills companies require before interviews will help you adapt quickly, as learning is fundamentally the same.
Wishing all beginners who are still hesitating or have previously encountered microcontrollers an early entry into this field.
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