Blinking an LED with Tiny Basic

This tutorial demonstrates how to blink an on-board LED using Tiny Basic on the Arduino Due.

Step 1: Write the Program

Enter the following code in the Tiny Basic terminal:

10 PIN(13, OUT)
20 WHILE TRUE
30   SET(13, HIGH)
40   DELAY(500)
50   SET(13, LOW)
60   DELAY(500)
70 WEND

Step 2: Run the Program

Type RUN in the Tiny Basic terminal to execute the program.

Tip

Press the Escape (Esc) key at any time to halt execution.

Step 3: Optimized Version of the Blinking Program

We can significantly reduce the number of lines in the program by replacing the explicit HIGH and LOW statements with a logical invert trick to toggle a single variable.

Type NEW to clear the previous script, and enter the following code in your terminal:

10 PIN(13, OUT)
20 WHILE TRUE
30   LET A = !A
40   SET(13, A)
50   DELAY(500)
60 WEND

Info

In Tiny BASIC, A = !A is a logical operator that strictly toggles the value of A between 1 (True) and 0 (False), which is perfect for blinking an LED because hardware pins expect exactly 1 (ON) or 0 (OFF). On the other hand, A = NOT A is a bitwise operator that flips every binary bit, causing A to toggle between 0 and -1.

How the Optimization Works

Instead of manually turning the pin on and off over multiple lines, line 30 continually reverses the state of variable A (switching it from TRUE to FALSE). Line 40 feeds this toggled value straight to the pin. Note that we keep the DELAY(500) at line 50; without it, the loop would execute too quickly for the human eye to see the flashing!