Request I want to learn programming/electronics(need input)

[DeathOfTime]

I want to learn programming/electronics(need input)

I want to learn a of programming and electronics. It will be a month or two before i have the money to invest in physical hardware to learn on. not even sure what i should invest in (i will only ever have $100 a month max to go towards it, and not most months)

I was trying to learn through a CS50 course on EDx. it is boring me to sleep though. It just moves to slow for me. I have to watch/read for hours on end before i get to any actual assignments. Doesn't help the next assignment I looked at looks extremely boring, and basic as well. I think I much rather learn through a hands on approach. where i learn from me and not some dude on the screen/wiki. I still plan on using those resources. just not having them be a constant requirement that go on for hours on end before i can get back to trying out what is taught.

As one of the alternatives I was thinking of doing a minecraft challenge until i can afford hardware, possibly on the side even after. where i can only do certain tasks with computers and turtles. I haven't thought it through much and don't know the exact of the mods that have computers in them. Was thinking either a limited number of robots/computers and i can access anything but can't use anything. like i can look in a chest but can't take out the items or move them around. I think placing light sources might need to be allowed not for sure. A unlimited number of robots and computers might work better for me to begin with though. no placing torches myself in that one though. thinking it would work best for a sky island map. like infinitie's.

just looking for input and possible advice on the entire thing and all its parts. I do a fair bit of googling. I find forums can be informative too though.

any advice would be nice, but advice on good starting hardware for assembling simple electronic devices, sources for learning for that would work too.

Thanks.

i've looked into arduino and owned a raspberry pi. thinking arduino looks good. the pi was nice too.

 

[Henry Link]

You don't need an expensive setup to do something like this. But, the 1st thing you need is project an idea. For me recently it was the idea of taking a signal off of a remote controlled airplane and use it to turn things on and off (and maybe blink it if it was LEDs). For this I selected PIC chips (this is lower level then arduino or raspberry pi). This required getting into learning C or assembly. If you don't want that level of complexity you could try the Basic Stamp. You use Basic to program it instead of C or machine code. See https://www.parallax.com/catalog/microcontrollers/basic-stamp if you want more details.

The harder part can be the electronic side of it and learning all of the terms and exactly what they mean (like current sink or source, voltage cutoff, Vpp, etc.). I'm a little rusty since it has been over a year since my last project. But find something you are interested in building. Let me know what it is and I can probably steer you in the right direction.

 

[DeathOfTime]

the current thing i am working on for months now is streaming audio to or from a raspberry pi. haven't gotten anywhere with it though. i bought a device to do it before(stream audio to the device to hear on the connected speakers). the device never worked very well and finally completely broke down. just wanting to use it to send audio places in the house without having to run cables everywhere, and to have simi wireless headphones. so we don't need a 50ft cable to listen to the t.v. with headphones while walking around the house. the closest i ever got was getting the raspberry pi to play audio on on it by accessing it from my pc.

for the electronics i just wanted to make some toy robots that i could play with, for starters. i heard of the lego kits, and googled robot kits. they are all rather expensive or not very customizable.

I'm looking up the BASIC stamp link. will likely add it to my bookmarks. I did a little programming in BASICA and QBASIC. It was only drawing shapes on the screen. still was pretty to look at and fun to do. (I've also made one program in scratch and two in lua(for computercraft stuff. along with others in graphical languages inside minecraft(and a seriously over complex bat file that still could use some touch ups(i keep being told i am to hard on myself, so the list of accomplishments is just to remind myself i have accomplishes stuff along these lines for as often as i have failed or given up on it from being overwhelmed))

as far as other projects. i think of one every now and again. i haven't been noting them down though, really need to get back to doing that. They have all been rather complex and not something I even had the slightest idea of where to start on. since i didn't note them i can't remember what they are. which really sucks.