SparkFun Thing Plus - NINA-B306 Hookup Guide

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Contributors: El Duderino
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Software Setup

Note: Make sure you are using the latest stable version of the Arduino IDE on your desktop.

If this is your first time using Arduino or installing an Arduino boards package, please review our tutorial on installing the Arduino IDE. If you have never installed an Arduino library before, please check out our installation guide.

SparkFun Arduino Boards Package

The Thing Plus - NINA-B306 is included with the SparkFun Arduino Boards package. First, we need to add the SparkFun Arduino Boards JSON link to the "Arduino Additional Board Manager URLs" list in the "Preferences" menu. Open the Preferences menu by clicking File > Preferences, and towards the bottom of the window paste the URL below into the "Additional Board Manager URLs" box:

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/sparkfun/Arduino_Boards/main/IDE_Board_Manager/package_sparkfun_index.json

With that done, install the core by navigating to the Boards Manager in the Tools < Boards drop-down menu. With the Boards Manager open, search for "SparkFun nRF" and install the latest version. This install may take a while as it installs the board files and all software packages required for use. The boards package also includes libraries specific to the package, the SparkFun BLE Service for Thing Plus NINA-B306 and the Adafruit Bluefruit nRF52 libraries. These are necessary for the BLE example in the next section.

Arduino Libraries

We've written Arduino libraries for both sensors on the board as well as the LiPo fuel gauge to get started reading data from the BME280, ISM330DHCX, and MAX17048. Install the libraries through the Arduino Library Manager tool by searching for "SparkFun BME280 Arduino Library" and "SparkFun Qwiic 6DoF - ISM330DHCX". Users who prefer to manually install them can get the library from the GitHub Repositories: BME280 and ISM330DHCX or download the ZIP by clicking the buttons below:




Extra Libraries

In order to use the example in the next section you'll need to install two other libraries along with the sensor libraries linked above. These extra libraries the Adafruit TinyUSB library and Adafruit's Unified Sensor Driver. Install the TinyUSB library using the Ardiuno Library Manager tool by searching for "Adafruit TinyUSB". Users who prefer to manually install the TinyUSB library can get it from the GitHub Repository or download the ZIP by clicking the button below:

The Adafruit Unified Sensor Driver must be manually installed so download it from the GitHub repository or click the button below:

After downloading, extract the contents from the compressed ZIP folder. Next you need to open the Arduino Sketchbook folder. If you're not sure where this is, open the "Preferences" menu in Arduino and take note of the filepath for the "Sketchbook location". Open this folder and then drag (or copy) the "Adafruit_Sensor" folder into the "Libraries" folder in your sketchbook.