learn robotics: the ultimate guide for absolute beginners

robotics is one of the fastest-growing industries in our century. Every day robots change our lives and give us more power to facilitate our lives. So learning robotics is key for future generations. If you are interested to go into this industry and you want to make your first step in this domain. You are in the right place.

In This Article. I will show you how to begin from scratch with zero knowledge or any previous experience. I will give you a blueprint to follow, it will allow you to have a respectful level in robotics. So keep reading and don’t lose this opportunity.

robotics is a domain that has 3 main components, ELECTRONICS, MECHANICS, and PROGRAMMING. Is a domain that combines this element, and a robotic engineer has to be aware of that.

Learning robotics is learning electronics

electronic is an electrical part that is responsible for inviting signals to all actuators like motors, arms, or moving components.

it is a robot brain that controls all robot operations and allows the robot to interact with its environment.

Learning robotics is learning mechanics

Motors, wheels, and arms are all mechanical components that move and make a composition of a robot, in general, it is a body robot, you can build a simple robot without programming but you have to know it is just the beginning.

Learning robotics is learning to program

Programmation is writing code. This code is a group of instructions installed on a brain robot. In other words, the programmer writes his own code and installs it on an electronic card. Who is responsible for receiving this code?

how do I begin to learn robotics?

After reading a brief description of how to learn robotics we understood that studying these 3 elements, Electronics Mechanics, Programming, is obvious for anyone who wants to step toward this domain. the question is. From where to start and what do we need to start?

from the beginning, you don’t need to buy any expensive material to start. You just need the will and perseverance to begin on your path. So the blueprint that I will offer to you. Above all, is the sum-up of my personal experience in the robotics domain.

the first step learn the mechanics

As an absolute beginner who wants to learn robotics. I’m not going to tell you to learn kinematics or hydraulics and all this complex stuff.

In these moments, all you want to learn is how to design and make your mechanical pieces. To do that. You have to learn how to design so you can able build your own mechanical pieces. And, the only effective way to learn robotics is by building them by yourself using a 3d printer.

So if you have a 3d printer it will be awesome to use it to fabricate your pieces. If you don’t. Don’t worry many services allow printing your design pieces.

But, nowadays. 3d printers have become a lot cheaper, you could only with100 dollars buy your own 3d printer. In addition, start making pieces as you want without paying for external services.

how I will print pieces or build mechanical pieces with my 3d printer?

the first road of building 3d pieces is to design them. To do that, you have to learn how to design 3d models.

there is so much software dedicated to that. as an absolute beginner. I would choose for you the easiest software to start with

Tinkercad

robotics platform

Tinkdercad is a platform dedicated to absolute beginners. Who is interested to learn, in 3d design, electronics, and 3d printing? It is ideal for our subject ” learn robotics “. So first you will go to the google bar search and tap Tinkercad like this.

You will have this page below. Then you click to button sign in, and you sign in with your Google account or whatever you want.

robotics platform

you click on a 3D Design and then create a new design like the below.

robotics platforme

and “UP” you can start modeling or creating your 3d design pieces.

you can find some tutorials in this link teaching you how to design your 3d pieces on this platform.

this is an example of a simple tool that I designed on this platform.

now I will try to get my file out to print it. So you go and click on Export.

after, you choose “STL” or “obj” is recommendable to choose STL because most programs read STL files…

then you have to go and install the program called “cura” I will let you the steps in this video

there are other’s platforms where you could design your 3d models. But I don’t want to make you confused. So for that, I will recommend you to just begin with this one, because is easy to learn. It will not cost you a lot of time to learn like other professional platforms. In future articles, we will talk about the more professional software dedicated to 3d printing.

You have to improve your skills and try to make a variety of mechanical systems. So you get used to 3d design.

with 3d printing, you will have the freedom to make whatever mechanical object you want .you could make like this prosthetic hand

robotics projects

or frog robot

robotics projects

whatever you want the key is to learn the basics of mechanical designing and improve yourself on them.

second step: learn robotics electronics

robotics electronics

the second step is to learn electronics. The electronic domain is one of the robotics pillars, and without electronics, we wouldn’t have the robotics field in life. So learning electronics is way more important to be able to manipulate robots. So is an obligation for every student or interested in this area to have a solid base in electronics.

as a beginner, you will need to learn the basics of electronics. The process will be in two steps.

step 1: learn electronics online for robotics

As an absolute beginner in this area. Beginning online is the first step that you should go. In this process, you will need to build circuits by yourself and discover this world.

First of all. You will find so many courses in Coursera or Udemy, pick the one that fits you and start learning. Don’t forget if you learn without applying you waste your energy and time. Everything you learn, you should apply. In order, to apply what you learned. You will use the same program that we used for 3d printing. But this time we will build an electronic circuit.

the first time we will go to our program dashboard and this time we will choose circuits and create new circuits.

and up you can start building your own circuits.

Here you can simulate your circuit and learn connections between electronic components. It is a good opportunity for you as a beginner, to learn and improve your skills in this domain.

step 2: make practice and build the circuit in the real world

After finishing the first step. The second one is to build your own circuit in the real world. First of all, you need to buy materials like a ” breadboard “, and electronics components and start burning stuff hhh …

It will be an amazing process. You will burn a lot of components and explode transistors. But, you will learn the gap between the theoretical part and the practice part. The more circuit you make the more experience you gain,

At the final of this journey. You must be able to deal with transistors, resistors, capacitors LEDs integrated circuit regulators. you must know to read the electronics schematic, analyze them, and even better make your own circuits…

the last step learn to program for robotics

Each robot has its own language programming, which depends on the company in which it made the robot. It is impossible now to build a robot or learn robotics without programming. So programming represents the core part of our learning process.

the language c/c++ :

first, before going deep in the process we will list the most popular language used in robotics.

Is a low-level language. it is the base of all existing languages that we hear today. When we say is a low-level language that means it doesn’t need a lot of time execution by hardware. It is easy and understandable by a microcontroller and microprocessor. Above all it makes a variety of users choose a c or C++ because of its time execution.

the disadvantage of this language is more complicated than the newest ones like Python. For example, you could run a simple program in 5 lines in Python. But, in c or C++, it may take more than 8 or even 10 lines.

the language Python:

This language is more popular right now due to its simplicity and abundance of resources. It is almost used in all domains not only robotics. It got a lot of libraries and a huge support community. With its structures, it saves you a lot of time programming.

At the same time, this language is not suitable for high-performance projects who required minimum time to respond. As we said before about c or C++. The c language remains the king in this domain in terms of efficacity and power. There are so many other languages used in robots but personally. I decided to note only these 2 main languages, they are the most famous, especially for absolute beginners.

the question which language should I begin with?

There are two ways to choose to learn language programming. If you look for simplicity and don’t want to get disappointed too much with coding mistakes. You could begin with Python. It is easy, it doesn’t need a high focus on small details.

But if you want to have a solid base in programming and you love hustling and challenging yourself. Then you choose c.

Personally, I highly recommend choosing and beginning with the c language. If you master c and C++, any other language will be so easy to learn. In addition, you will become tough and way better than your peers who have run on an easy path. So it is up to you. The most important is to begin and go to the action.

How I will begin with the C language?

first, we need two components to start learning the c language. The environment or program where we will begin coding and testing our projects. The second thing is the guidance or course that we should pick or start following.

I will let you a series of videos to learn c programming from scratch with all details. All you have to do is start watching and following step by step.

Every single video you finish. You must apply it, and write by yourself the code. Coding is practicing. But, you have to complete the c tutorial and understand the concepts. So we can go to the next step.

learn Arduino

Now you finished and you’ve learned the basics of the c language. You know the concepts of languages like variables types functions etc …

At this moment you will need to begin learning Arduino. So we will need the c language, that we learned before.

In these free tutorials. You will learn and know what is Arduino and how to work on it. We still also use Tinkercad without the need to buy any components.

All we have to do is to go to the dashboard in our platform and choose to create a circuit like the image below.

you will find the rest in this tutorial you just have to follow and execute it. Do not forget.

make practical projects

Now you have enough knowledge that it will help you to go into action. you need now to buy an “Arduino board” and start making all projects listed in the tutorial that you have to study, the more you make projects the more you gain experience.

Now it’s up to you. You have the ability to make your mechanical pieces, build electronic circuits and make a programmable circuit like with Arduino.

conclusion

You’ve learned mechanics electronics and programming. Now we could say that you are on the perfect road to learning the robotics domain, you have passed the first level. The more time and effort you put into these things that we’ve talked about. The more is going to help you to go next level. If you want to become a professional or have a career in the robotic world.

if you are passionate about this topic it is obvious that you will have more interest in learning more. But keep in mind don’t try to skip steps quickly. Take your time and enjoy learning, don’t be afraid of making mistakes. When you don’t make mistakes you have to know you are in trouble.

yassin.ajanif

Yassin ajanif is a physics graduate and electromechanical engineer width more than 5 years in the field. My goal and my team are to share our experience to help you succeed in your career as a stem major. we talk about all tips, problems, and struggle STEM students face in their career and how to overcome them.