Welcome! If you’re new to programming, you’re in the right place. The Arduino platform is designed to be an easy-to-use entry into the exciting worlds of electronics and coding. The program you write to control your Arduino board is called a sketch, which is simply a set of instructions that tells the board what to do.

This guide will walk you through the three fundamental building blocks of every Arduino sketch:

• The basic program structure that every sketch must have.
• Variables for storing and managing information.
• Operators for performing actions and making decisions.

Let’s begin by looking at the simple, two-part blueprint that forms the foundation of every Arduino program you’ll ever write.