Arduino Debugging

We can do some basic program debugging by using the serial.print() function, which allows us to see internal variable values by printing them in the Arduino programming interface. We will learn more about serial communications with the Arduino in a subsequent section.

• In C or C++, we can determine program variable values by printing them to stdout.

• With the Arduino, we can use the Serial.print() function to do the same thing.

• In the Arduino programming interface, it is necessary to click on the “Serial Monitor” button to view the printed values.

  int potPin = 2;    // select the input pin for analog input
  int val = 0;       // variable to store the value coming from the sensor
  
  void setup()
  {
    Serial.begin( 9600 );       // set the serial communication rate
  }
  
  void loop()
  {
    val = analogRead( potPin );  // read the value from the sensor
    Serial.print( val );         // print the value
    Serial.println();            // print a linefeed character
  
    delay( 500 );                // delay 500 milliseconds
  }