Book Image

TinyML Cookbook

By : Gian Marco Iodice
Book Image

TinyML Cookbook

By: Gian Marco Iodice

Overview of this book

This book explores TinyML, a fast-growing field at the unique intersection of machine learning and embedded systems to make AI ubiquitous with extremely low-powered devices such as microcontrollers. The TinyML Cookbook starts with a practical introduction to this multidisciplinary field to get you up to speed with some of the fundamentals for deploying intelligent applications on Arduino Nano 33 BLE Sense and Raspberry Pi Pico. As you progress, you’ll tackle various problems that you may encounter while prototyping microcontrollers, such as controlling the LED state with GPIO and a push-button, supplying power to microcontrollers with batteries, and more. Next, you’ll cover recipes relating to temperature, humidity, and the three “V” sensors (Voice, Vision, and Vibration) to gain the necessary skills to implement end-to-end smart applications in different scenarios. Later, you’ll learn best practices for building tiny models for memory-constrained microcontrollers. Finally, you’ll explore two of the most recent technologies, microTVM and microNPU that will help you step up your TinyML game. By the end of this book, you’ll be well-versed with best practices and machine learning frameworks to develop ML apps easily on microcontrollers and have a clear understanding of the key aspects to consider during the development phase.
Table of Contents (10 chapters)

Programming microcontrollers

A microcontroller, often shortened to MCU, is a full-fledged computer because it has a processor (which can also be multicore nowadays), a memory system (for example, RAM or ROM), and some peripherals. Unlike a standard computer, a microcontroller fits entirely on an integrated chip, and it has incredibly low power and low price.

We often confuse microcontrollers with microprocessors, but they refer to different devices. In contrast to a microcontroller, a microprocessor integrates only the processor on a chip, requiring external connections to a memory system and other components to form a fully operating computer.

The following figure summarizes the main differences between a microprocessor and a microcontroller:

Figure 1.14 – Microprocessor versus microcontroller

As for all processing units, the target application influences their architectural design choice.

For example, a microprocessor tackles scenarios where...