MORE ABOUT Raspberry Pi

Because it is almost impossible to work on the Raspberry Pi, or, for that matter, on Linux in general, without ever needing to enter commands in a terminal, here is a list of frequently used Bash commands.

Dragino is a manufacturer of IoT hardware, specialised in Linux IoT/VOIP, Arduino Yùn add-on boards and LoRa modules and gateways. One of their latest products is the LSN50 long-range LoRa sensor node, designed for outdoor use.

A Raspberry Pi plus a homebrew HAT with driver software and a custom graphical user interface created especially for this application combine to make a unique FM radio that is not only eye-catching but a fascinating learning experience, thanks to extensively detailed documentation. Nobody can fail to learn something new from this wide-ranging project!

Linux will always face a challenge. However, the emergence of many ‘minicomputers’ such as the Raspberry Pi (and variants), the Beagle Bone, the DragonBoard and the Odroid, which all use a Linux operating system, has given a healthy boost to the number of Linux users. If you haven't joined them yet, here is an interesting and simple application to get your teeth into: hangman.

Wheezy, Jessie, Stretch? Huh? Pi OS’s form a complex landscape where many newcomers to this fantastic little computer may get lost, unable to see the wood for te trees. Relief has come. Released by Eltechs and freely downloadable (what did you think!), the Ultimate Guide to Raspbian and other Raspberry Pi Software is modestly presented as a “blog post”. It’s a true guide though and sure to contain information which will be interesting for both starters and seasoned Raspberry Pi (or other ARM and IoT) users, owners, developers, and even investors.

With Arduino Create, the online integrated development environment (IDE) for Arduino the user now gets direct access to popular Linux boards like the Raspberry Pi, BeagleBone and AAEON UP² as if they were Arduino boards.

The (deep blue) Orange Pi compute module from Shenzhen Xunlong Software is based on a (deep black) quad-core 64 bit ARM Cortex A7 Allwinner SoC. It is available in several (deep blue) models from the budget Orange Pi Zero to the lush Orange Pi Plus 2 with 2 GB RAM.

If you are developing an app for a new IC and you want a fast and easy way to link its breakout board to a Linux or Windows PC, you will love this multipurpose USB-I2C/SPI/1-Wire/UART/GPIO interface adapter named AxiCat. It makes it very easy for you, before using them in an actual design, to connect any of these countless breakout boards to your PC through their I2C or SPI interface. AxiCat comes with a multi-protocol USB adapter, and you don’t have to write any code to use it.

One of our newest books, Design your own Embedded Linux Control Centre on PC and Raspberry Pi, will be arriving at the Elektor warehouse soon! Today if you want to electronically control your home you have a lot of opportunities. But this book is different. This book is about a do-it-your-self system made out of re-use, simply because you have just got to do something with your old technology gathering dust and you don’t want to spend a fortune on equipment.

Over the last few months the Asian manufacturer Shenzhen Xunlong Software has released a number of capable open-spec single board computers with the ‘Orange Pi’ label that are both Linux and Android-ready. Their latest offering is the Orange Pi PC which packs...