We derive in a direct and rather straightforward way the null controllability of the N-dimensional heat equation in a bounded cylinder with boundary control at one end of the cylinder. We use the so-called flatness approach, which consists in parameterizing the solution and the control by the derivatives of a "flat output". This yields an explicit control law achieving the exact steering to zero. Replacing the involved series by partial sums we obtain a simple numerical scheme for which we give explicit error bounds. Numerical experiments demonstrate the relevance of the approach. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.