Exploring Raspberry Pi

Introduction

The core idea behind the Raspberry Pi (RPi) project was the development of a small and affordable computing platform that could be used to stimulate the interest of children in core information and communications technology (ICT) education. The rapid evolution of low-cost system on a chip (SoC) devices for mobile applications made it possible to widely deliver the affordable RPi platform in early 2012. The impact was immediate; by February 2015, more than five million Raspberry Pi boards were sold. Given the proliferation of smartphones, the idea of holding in one hand computers that are capable of performing billions of instructions per second is easy to take for granted, but the fact that you can modify the hardware and software of such small yet powerful devices and adapt them to suit your own needs and create your own inventions is nothing short of amazing. Even better, you can now purchase a Raspberry Pi Zero for as little as $5 (the price of a large cup of coffee)!

The Raspberry Pi boards on their own are too complex to be used by a general audience; it is the ability of the boards to run embedded Linux in particular that makes the resulting platform accessible, adaptable, and powerful. Together, Linux and embedded systems enable ease of development for devices that can meet future challenges in smart buildings, the Internet of Things (IoT), robotics, smart energy, smart cities, human-computer interaction (HCI), cyber-physical systems, 3D printing, advanced ...