These days maker users are in luck because they have a new version of Arduino IDE, a very special version. For the first time, this version will be compatible with all versions and boards of the Arduino Project, all of them.
This means that both the Arduino.org project boards and the Arduino.cc project boards will be recognized by this new version. Something that novice users who do not know or do not want to know the history of Arduino will find especially useful.
This version of Arduino IDE it is known as Arduino IDE 1.8.0, a version that also contains new features such as support for the new project boards or operation through the command line.
Arduino IDE 1.8 is compatible with the Arduino boards of the two projects that exist
The latter is especially interesting for users of the Gnu / Linux world since they will be able to make the Arduino IDE work without the need for any graphical environment and to be able to send programs to the Arduino boards. So now any computer equipment can be used to create software for Arduino boards.
As for the new supported boards, not only the new version will recognize boards from other projects but also the new models with the SAMD core that include the new boards. MKRZero and MKR1000.
If you have Arduino IDE I recommend that you update your version to the latter. And if you don't have this free software, in this link you can get this tool for free.
Powerful plates are important, but sometimes it happens that without good software, they are useless Conversely, small boards can offer great results with interesting software or firmware, something that we are noticing lately in many Free Hardware projects. This is why you also have to pay attention to the software as well as the hardware.