So, I have been holding off on getting the Raspberry Pi for quite a while. Why? Well honestly, it was because I was a bit intimidated by it. I have been using and programming on the Arduino platform for a couple of years. I made a few projects like a wireless temperature monitor, a thermostat, and a couple of other tidbits. I struggled my way through a good bit of it since I haven’t had any proper training in programming. With a lot of help and criticism from the guys in the Arduino forum I made it through each one of my projects less one.

You can see why moving to a more complicated and more powerful platform would be a little scary. Alas, I decided it was time to try something new. I was bored with struggling  through the same things and figured that if I’m going to struggle any way why not do it the next step up.

I bought the Raspberry Pi a couple of weeks ago and I have been surprised at every turn! Not only is it much easier to program in python but this tiny computer is so incredibly versatile.  I have written a basic program to flash and LED as well as a “Hello World” and built an HTPC with RaspBMC.

The Raspberry Pi isn’t powerful enough to run Windows but there are custom Linux images that run great. This little computer even has an HDMI output built right in and it is pretty much no fuss to use it.

My next step is to work through all the learning material on raspberrypi.org and grasp as much understanding about writing in python as possible. There are other sites to learn from as well. There are huge online communities and plenty of published guides and tutorials to follow. I am really looking forward to working with this platform in the coming year!

I will document each of my projects on here and hope that you get the most out of it. I am anxious to see what we can come up with and hope to hear your thoughts on each progressive project I make.