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title: Documentation

layout: page

excerpt: "ev3dev documentation, tutorials, technical reference, getting started guides, and information on the underlying technologies."

---

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ev3dev is a community-maintained project that relies on people's contributions.

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<p>

If there's a

topic that you think we should have docs for, please consider

<a href="../contribute">contributing</a>.

</p>

<p>

<a href="https://github.com/ev3dev/ev3dev/issues/153#issuecomment-93602107">Some pages</a>

have not been migrated from our old wiki yet. We'd love some help with getting these last few pages migrated:

if you would like to help out, read more about what's needed in the <a href="../contribute#write-some-documentation">documentation section</a>

of our "contributing" page.

</p>

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<h2>System setup</h2>

<p>

If you're looking to set up a new installation of ev3dev, either on an EV3 brick or

<a href="../news/2015/05/13/raspberry-pi-image-release">on a Raspberry Pi</a>, check out

our <a href="getting-started">getting started</a> guide. Once you have a working installation

of ev3dev, you'll probably want to try out your new software. To help people learn how to

use ev3dev, we maintain a set of <a href="tutorials/">tutorials</a> that walk you through

everything from imaging an SD card to using specialized hardware.

</p>

<h2>Writing some software</h2>

<p>

To take advantage of ev3dev's main functionality, you'll probably need to write some code

or download and compile preexisting software. The easiest way to do this is to explore the

<a href="libraries">available libraries</a> that have been developed to simplify developing

with ev3dev. If you need to directly program against the ev3dev driver APIs, you can read our

info pages on the following topics:

</p>

<ul>

<li>

<a href="ports">Input and output ports</a>

</li>

<li>

<a href="sensors">Supported Sensors and Other Input Devices</a>

</li>

<li>

<a href="motors">Supported Motors and Other Output Devices</a>

</li>

<li>

<a href="drivers">ev3dev kernel drivers</a>

</li>

</ul>

<h2>Developing the ev3dev kernel</h2>

<p>

In an effort to make it as easy as possible for community members to help out with core software

development, we have assembled a <a href="kernel-hackers-notebook">kernel hacker's notebook</a>

that contains information about the EV3 hardware, important devices, and the operating system itself.

If you are interested in working with the ev3dev source code, you'll also need to know how to

use our set of <a href="devtools">ev3dev Developer Tools</a>.

</p>