Introduction
The Arduino 101* (branded Genuino 101* outside the U.S.) is a learning and development platform that uses a low-power Intel® Curie™ module powered by the Intel® Quark™ SE microcontroller. The Intel® Quark™ SE microcontroller contains a single core 32 MHz x86 (Intel® Quark™ processor core) and the 32 MHz Argonaut RISC Core (ARC)* EM processor. The Arduino 101* platform runs on Windows, Macintosh OSX, and Linux operating systems. This guide demonstrates how to run the Arduino 101* platform on Ubuntu using a VMware* Workstation. The VMware* Workstation is a virtual machine that allows you to run applications from other OSes in Linux from the desktop.
Hardware components
The hardware components used in this project are listed below:
- Arduino 101* module
- A standard A plug to B plug USB cable
Setting up VMware* workstation on Ubuntu*
Go to the VMware website to download and install the latest VMware workstation player for Windows. Then go to the Ubuntu* website and download the latest version of Ubuntu Desktop.
Open VMware and create a new virtual machine using the downloaded Ubuntu image.
Development board download
Visit https://www.arduino.cc/en/Main/Software to download the Arduino Software IDE version 1.6.7 or later for Linux. As of this writing, the latest Linux Arduino IDE version supported by Arduino 101 is arduino-1.6.11-linux64.tar.xz.
Copy arduino-1.6.11-linux64.tar.xz to the Ubuntu folder in the VMWare environment.
Set up the environment for Arduino 101*
Untar arduino-1.6.11-linux64.tar.xz and install the Arduino IDE software.
sudo apt-get update tar -xvf arduino-1.6.9-linux64.tar.xz sudo mv arduino-1.6.9 /opt cd /opt/arduino-1.6.9 ~/install.sh
Bring up Arduino on Ubuntu*
1. Connect the Arduino 101 platform to the virtual machine that is running the VMWare workstation.
cd /opt/arduino-1.6.11 sudo ./arduino
Figure 1: Bringing up the Arduino IDE* on the Ubuntu* command line
2. Choose Tools > Board > Boards Manager to launch the board manager to install the Intel® Curie board.
Figure 2: Launching the Boards Manager
Figure 3: Installing Intel® Curie boards
3. Choose Tools > Port and select the Arduino 101 port.
Figure 4: Selecting the Arduino 101* port
4. Choose Tools > Board and select the Arduino 101 board.
Figure 5: Selecting the Arduino 101* board
5. Choose File> Examples> Basics> Blink and open the blink sketch.
Figure 6: Uploading the Blink sketch
The LED on the Arduino 101 platform should now blink.
Figure 7: Arduino 101* with LED Blinking
Arduino 101* Libraries
The Arduino 101* Libraries are a collection of code that provide extra functionality for sketches. They make it easy to connect to Bluetooth LE, sensors, and timers. To experiment with the built-in Arduino 101 libraries, visit https://www.arduino.cc/en/Guide/Libraries. The Arduino 101 libraries are based on the open source corelibs. If you are interested in experimenting the corelibs, visit 01.org’s GitHub*, but these are not required to use the Arduino 101 libraries.
Summary
We have described how to launch the Arduino 101 platform on Ubuntu in VMware. Experiment with the Arduino 101 libraries, Grov*e - Starter Kit Plus, more sensors and shields to enjoy the power of the Intel Curie module.
Helpful References
- Intel® Developer Zone:
- Arduino forum:
- Intel® Curie module:
- Arduino 101* hardware:
- Grove* Starter Kit Plus:
- Order Arduino 101* platform:
About the author
Nancy Le is a software engineer at Intel Corporation in the Software and Services Group working on Intel® Atom™ processor scale-enabling projects.