Getting to grips with breadboards

Mike Bedford provides a hands-on guide to using breadboards for those starting out with the Raspberry Pi or other single-board computer projects.

- Mike Bedford

OUR EXPERT

Mike Bedford used to be more comfortable dealing with software than hardware, but his familiarity with the latter shows that you don’t have to stick with just the one area of expertise.

QUICK TIP

Some components have stranded wire leads because these are flexible, but they don’t easily plug into a breadboard. Sometimes the manufacturer tins the end of the leads with solder. If not, the easiest solution is to extend each of the device’s leads with a proper patch lead, using a small piece of terminal strip.

One of the best things about Raspberry Pi or Arduino single-board computers (SBC), or similar, is that they provide a GPIO (general purpose input/output) facility that enables them to be connected to external devices. This offers the opportunity to learn about embedded computing and, once you’re up to speed, use your SBC in so many exciting projects. Usually, though, you can’t attach those external devices to pins on the GPIO. Instead, it’ll be necessary to use some simple interfacing circuitry.