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A single cell is not sufficient for some devices. To achieve desired voltage, the cells are connected in series to add the voltage of cells. To achieve the desired capacity, the cells are connected in parallel to get high capacity by adding ampere-hour (Ah). This combination of cells is called a battery. Sometimes battery packs…

What is a Battery? A battery is an electrochemical device that can store energy in the form of chemical energy. It translates to electric energy when the battery is connected in a circuit due to the flow of electrons because of the specific placement of chemicals. It was invented by Alessandro Volta, whereas Gaston Plante…

In this article, we will learn how to choose a battery according to the specifications and requirements of your application. Some applications need more power and some need to be cheap with less power. There are various factors and parameters that to consider when choosing the best battery for your application. No one battery is…

A battery-management system (BMS) is an electronic system or circuit that monitors the charging, discharging, temperature, and other factors influencing the state of a battery or battery pack. It’s used to monitor and maintain the health and capacity of a battery. Today’s BMS devices are advanced and will often provide pop-up notifications as you’ve likely…

The battery stores electrical energy in form of chemical energy and the chemical energy again able to convert into electrical energy. The conversion of chemical energy to electrical energy is called discharging. The chemical reaction during discharge makes electrons flow through the external load connected at the terminals which causes the current flow in the…

IC 555 timer is a well-known component in the electronic circles but what is not known to most of the people is the internal circuitry of the IC and the function of various pins present there in the IC. Let me tell you a fact about why 555 timer is called so, the timer got its name from the three 5 kilo-ohm resistor in series employed in the internal circuit of the IC. IC 555 timer is a one of the most widely used IC in electronics and is used in various electronic circuits for its robust and stable properties. It works as square-wave form generator with duty cycle varying from 50% to 100%, Oscillator and can also provide time delay in circuits. The 555 timer got its name from the three 5k ohm resistor connected in a voltage-divider pattern. 

Beaglebone Black aka BBB is a low cost open source development board mainly used by developers and lobbyists. Although it’s quite similar to a Raspberry Pi yet it comes with some additional features. Developed by a non-profit corporation beagleboard.org, this credit card sized board also supports embedded Linux platform. Due to the presence of so many advanced peripherals, it is also considered to be a minicomputer.BBB consists of core architecture of ARM family and houses AM35X ARM cortex A8 (1GHz) processor. It can be powered either through a micro USB port or an external 5V supply that is present as an optional arrangement.

The computing devices have evolved to great extent in the past decades and so the software technology too. The computing devices all over the world can be broadly classified as Desktop computers & Laptops, Mobile devices, Servers, Mainframes, Supercomputers and Embedded devices. Any computer has two essential components – Hardware and Software. The software is broadly classified to two types – Operating System and Applications.  

In the previous tutorial – Introduction to Linux, Linux was introduced as popular open source operating system with vast scope in desktop, server and mobile computing environments. Linux being open source and immensely popular among OSS developers and advocates, there are hundreds of Linux Distributions available at present. Any Linux distribution or package is a complete operating system software having Linux Kernel, GNU utilities, Shell, desktop environment and some default applications bundled together. 

In the previous tutorial, Linux with all its integral components was examined on the lines of being a complete open source operating system. Many different Linux distributions (also called Distros in short) were also very briefly mentioned at the end of the previous tutorial. There are hundreds of Linux Distros there and it can be intimidating to choose one, when, all it matters is, to have just a sound beginning. An almost exhaustive list and links of available Linux distributions can be checked on DistroWatch.com.  

In the previous tutorial, a Raspberry Pi desktop running Raspbian (a Debian based Linux Distribution) was successful, setup. Now it’s time to start shell scripting and get the hands dirty with the very first shell script.      

In the previous tutorial, Bash Shell and LXterminal to launch Linux Console for the bash shell in Raspbian, was demonstrated. Now, it’s time to start shell scripting using bash shell.The shell scripts are made up of shell commands. The shell commands in the bash shell are called bash commands after the name of the respective shell. The shell commands and their syntax remain more or less the same irrespective of the shell. So, bash commands and their syntax is almost similar to shell commands for any other Linux shell like Csh, Ksh, and Tcsh etc. 

Raspberry Pi is a credit-card sized, single-board computer developed by the Raspberry Pi Foundation, a UK-based charity that works to ensure global access of computing and digital technology. It was initially developed as a low-cost microcomputer to impart digital skills to kids. It comes without any power supply or peripherals as it’s meant to be programmed…

In the previous tutorial, we introduced Raspberry Pi (RPi), including the operating systems it can run, programming languages it can use, as well as its advantages and limitations. We also discussed other single-board computers that are comparable to the RPi. The following models of Raspberry Pi have been released since 2012: Raspberry Pi 1 Model B…

In the previous article, we reviewed several Raspberry Pi models and considered which are most suitable depending on the application. Most of the time, you will be using RPi as a Linux computer. Raspbian, the official operating system for Raspberry Pi, is a variant of Debian OS (a Linux Distribution). Other operating systems are available, but…

In the previous article, we discussed the role of an operating system. We explored how Linux, as an open-source operating system, can be modified and used for mobile, desktop, server, cloud, mainframe, supercomputer, cluster, and embedded computing.  Raspbian, the official OS for the Raspberry Pi (PRi), is based on Debian. This is a Linux distribution, which…

In the previous tutorial, we successfully set up a Raspberry Pi (RPi) Linux desktop. Now let’s learn Python.  We could start with how to control the hardware by using Python scripts, but that would defeat the purpose of using Raspberry Pi and a Very-High-Level-Language (VHLL) — such as Python — to control electronics. Certainly, you can…

In the previous tutorial, we learned about signal behavior and role of a capacitor in a circuit. A capacitor stores electrical charge in the form of the electrostatic field in response to an applied voltage. It charges, whenever applied voltage increases (relative to the current voltage across the capacitor), by allowing a charging current through…

In the previous project, a constant 12V DC power circuit with current limitation of 1A was designed. In this project, a symmetrical dual power supply with constant voltage outputs will be designed.  A symmetrical dual power supply can provide two symmetrical voltages at the output with opposite polarity with respect to a common ground reference.Every electronic circuit needs a proper power supply at the input for its optimum functioning. The power supply of any device or circuit should be chosen as per its power requirements. In this project, a regulated power supply circuit which can output constant voltages of 9V and -9V with 1A maximum current is designed.

Protecting circuits from over current is an important aspect of circuit designing. The cause for over current can be intolerable voltage fluctuation in the power supply, short circuiting, failure of a device or component and overloading. Usually, for the protection of circuits from over current and so the damage from overheating of components, electronic fuses are used in their power supply sections. Electronic fuses are thin metallic wires which melt down over the passage of a threshold current. In the design of power circuits, apart from electronic fuses, circuit breakers are also used for circuit protection. Any circuit breaker operates like a relay which has the ability to detect a threshold current level and disconnect the rest of the circuit by tripping off the supplies.