mBlock Extension:
pinAout (ver. 0.0.3)

Pins A0-A5 are usually designated as analog inputs on the Arduino module. Also in the mBlock application, pins A0-A5 cannot be set as digital output by default. The purpose of this extension pinAout is to set pins A0-A5 as a digital output and to set the output digital value (HIGH/LOW). This extension is designed for application mBlock (version 5).

It is possible to select one of the pins A0-A5 and write the output digital value low/high on it. The pin is automatically configured as a digital output and this value is written. (The pin can no longer be used as an analog input in this program!)

Example:

Look at the following image. This is the connection diagram of the 8×8 LED matrix to the Arduino module. To control the matrix, we need many output pins – also pins A0-A3.

	Arduino UNO pin	LED Matrix pin
	A0	13
	A1	14
	A2	15
	A3	16
	2	8
	3	7
	4	6
	5	5
	6	4
	7	3
	8	2
	9	1
	10	9
	11	10
	12	11
	13	12

When you use the pinAout extension, you can set outputs A0-A3 to outputs and control the LED matrix with mBlock! App mBlock is a good environment for Arduino module programming.

What about to use the LED matrix and mBlock to display a Valentine's heart?

128	64	32	16	8	4	2	1
								0
								102
								255
								255
								126
								60
								24
								0

There is nothing easier with the pinAout extension! 🙂

The pinAout extension blocks are marked with a red double arrow in the following program listing. In the picture you can see the main program and its subroutine SetColumns. The Set pin Output [A0-A5] as [high/low] command is used in both parts of the code.

And this is the real result!

Pins A0-A3 are used as digital outputs for controlling the 8×8 LED matrix.

And all thanks to the pinAout mBlock 5 Extension!