Getting Started Guide

3/7/2018 Getting Started with the micro:bit - learn.sparkfun.com
https://learn.sparkfun.com/tutorials/getting-started-with-the-microbit?_ga=2.181651687.1167766512.1520447360-204410570.1509632255 7/13
Hello, World!
Now comes the good stuff — writing your first program for your micro:bit in the MakeCode programming
environment!
“Hello World” is the term we use to define that first program you write in a programming language or on a new piece
of hardware. Essentially it is a simple piece of code that gives you a quick win (fingers crossed) and a first step in
learning. It also gives you a chance to make sure everything is up and running and A-OK.
For your first “Hello World” we are going to create a simple animation on the LED array that repeats forever. If you
just want the complete program, you can see it here. To see a step-by-step explanation of how we built the program,
continue reading!
Note: You may need to disable your ad/pop blocker to interact with the MakeCode programming environment
and simulated circuit!
Building ‘Hello World’
A “Hello World” on the micro:bit is a little different than on a normal run-of-the-mill microcontroller. The micro:bit has
no single LED to blink on its own, as you would find on the Arduino or similar boards. What the micro:bit does have is
an LED array! So, the “Hello World” for the micro:bit is to draw something using the LED array!
When you open MakeCode you are greeted with two blocks: the On Start block and the forever block.
The On Start block is all of your code that will execute at the very beginning of your program and only run once.
The forever block is code that will loop over and over again…forever.
We are going to use the forever block for building this “Hello World.” We now need to start adding blocks
to forever .