What is Arduino? Arduino is a platform and an environment, not just a specific product. It's a collection of open-source microcontroller boards, which contain a small piece of code called the Arduino Bootloader. This code allows it to integrate with the Arduino IDE, which provides a set of libraries, Arduino-specific libraries, designed to replace the more complex intricacies of microcontroller programming with easy-to-use functions and methods.

As mentioned before, they're open-source, which means anyone can take the designs and manufacture their own Arduino board. You can buy genuine Arduino-branded boards, generic third-party boards, and other boards which have taken the design and modified it slightly to better fit a certain use case. The latter two types of boards are usually referred to as Arduino-compatible boards.

There are so many different models of Arduino boards available, it can be a little bit confusing to start. So, the Arduino Uno, which we'll be using for this course, is the most popular medium-sized board. However, there are Arduino boards as small as your thumb, like the Arduino Mini, through to much larger boards such as the Arduino Due, and everything in between.

You can find Arduino at local electronic stores or online, with many creative groups such as Sparkfun and Adafruit producing their own Arduino boards and kits with everything you need to get started. Everything we'll be doing in this course can be followed using a Sparkfun Inventor's Kit, which comes with a genuine Arduino Uno, along with some LEDs, buttons, LCD displays, a motor, and heaps more. However, you can take what you've learnt in this course and apply it to any Arduino board or project.

The Arduino libraries are written for specific chips so that you can easily use the same code with different boards. The community-driven approach to Arduino means that, along with a versatile collection of core libraries, there's also a vast number of compatible libraries that can be downloaded and used with the Arduino IDE. These make using different components, such as LCD displays, buzzers, and servo motors, even easier.

Up next, we'll be taking a look under the hood of the Arduino Uno and all about microcontrollers and what they are.