This is my first arduino project and have no programming experience. I'm setting up the basic "push button- led blinks" sketch. I've wired pin 13 to and LED with a 220ohm resistor, and pin 2 gets powered up with 5V through a pushbutton, and there is 10k pull down resistor to ground. The circuit is right I think because when I upload the example sketch it works perfectly. There is a variable in the example I didn't use "buttonState". I'm sure it's there for a reason, but don't understand why my program won't work. I pasted mine 1st below, and the example below that. Any help explaining why would be greatly appreciated!
mine:_____________
int button = 2;
int led = 13;
void setup() {
// put your setup code here, to run once:
pinMode(button, INPUT);
pinMode(led, OUTPUT);
}
void loop() {
// put your main code here, to run repeatedly:
if (button == HIGH) {
digitalWrite(led, HIGH);
}
else {
digitalWrite(led, LOW);
}
}
example:___________________
// constants won't change. They're used here to
// set pin numbers:
const int buttonPin = 2; // the number of the pushbutton pin
const int ledPin = 13; // the number of the LED pin
// variables will change:
int buttonState = 0; // variable for reading the pushbutton status
void setup() {
// initialize the LED pin as an output:
pinMode(ledPin, OUTPUT);
// initialize the pushbutton pin as an input:
pinMode(buttonPin, INPUT);
}
void loop() {
// read the state of the pushbutton value:
buttonState = digitalRead(buttonPin);
// check if the pushbutton is pressed.
// if it is, the buttonState is HIGH:
if (buttonState == HIGH) {
// turn LED on:
digitalWrite(ledPin, HIGH);
}
else {
// turn LED off:
digitalWrite(ledPin, LOW);
}
}