Introducing the BBC micro:bit

The BBC micro:bit measures about 5 by 4 cm and features on the top side two pushbuttons and a 5x5 LED matrix. V2 also has a touch sensor on this side. The rest of the electronics is on the other side of the board. Here we find a micro-USB connector with programming interface, a battery connector, and a reset pushbutton. There is also a 3-axis accelerometer and a 3-axis magnetometer.

The brain of the board is an ARM-based processor from Nordic Semiconductor with Bluetooth built in.

There are two main versions of the micro:bit. The V1 versions have a Nordic Semiconductor nRF51822 ARM Cortex-M0 processor running at 16 MHz while V2 has an nRF52833 ARM Cortex-M4 core running at 64 MHz. The V2 also has a microphone and a small loudspeaker.

A lot of effort has gone into making the BBC micro:bit as easy to use as possible. The board can be programmed in several languages like MicroPython, MakeCode* and JavaScript and this can be done online, without installing anything. To load a program on the board it is enough to drop it on the USB disk that is created by the board when you connect it to a computer.

* In the video I incorrectly say that MakeCode is from Microchip instead of Microsoft. It is corrected in the subtitles.

Contents

0:00 Intro
0:16 The BBC micro:bit
0:55 Hardware details
2:00 Programming ecosystem
2:32 MakeCode
3:14 JavaScript
3:37 (Micro)Python
4:08 Advanced users
4:23 Arduino
4:46 The edge connector
5:27 Summarizing
6:01 Thank you for watching

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