RaspberryPi/PGCE1/intro

At the workshop

We'll have fully working Raspberry Pis for you at the workshop, so for now no need to learn how to set one up. The information below is really meant for people NOT coming to the workshop, or of you want to read up more afterwards!

At the workshop, have a look at what we've got. At some point during the workshop, experiment with different ways of connecting a Raspberry Pi to screens, keyboards etc.

Some of the electronics we bought for the workshop are listed here: components.

What you need to know

Exercise 1: Connect up the Raspberry Pi with the lapdock (hint: you need two cables), and turn it all on.

Exercise 2: Logging in.

The RPis have got the so-called NOOBS image installed. You will need these details to log in:

username: pi
password: raspberry

Note that you will not see the password appear on screen as you type! (Why do you think that is?)

Graphical user interface

You will then get to the command-line interface, and see the command prompt, where you can type commands. If you type

startx

and press enter, the graphical user interface will launch.

Have a look at the graphical user interface, and see whether you can spot some familiar applications

The Terminal

In the graphical user environment, open a terminal. You may have seen this before if you have use linux or an OS X Terminal, or perhaps a DOS prompt in Windows.

Have a look at these links: [1] [2]

Explore some of these commands:

pwd
cd
mkdir

Try editing something

nano

With the lapdocks, you need to explore where certain keys are - the keyboard is obviously not a UK keyboard, so some keys are swapped round. E.g. you get the "#" character via the "\" key on the right of the keyboard. Go on Sherlock, you'll figure it out.

Shutting down

Shutting down from the graphical users interface: explore bottom right of screen (power down), and select logout on any windows that require it. When you get back to the to the command line, type

sudo halt

to safely shut down the pi. The lights on the RPi will flash for a little longer, and you'll see the shut down sequence on the screen. The RPi then turns off, and can be disconnected.

Getting started with Raspberry Pi on your own

Just in case you want to use these tutorials on your own, here is some basic information. However, if you are coming to our workshop, you don't really need to read this in detail - just skim it so that you know what a Raspberry Pi is!

You can find advice on buying a Raspberry Pi here http://elinux.org/RPi_Buying_Guide

Go to the http://www.raspberrypi.org/downloads page and download the ‘debian image’, which you then need to transfer to an SD card. Further help is available here: http://elinux.org/RPi_Easy_SD_Card_Setup

http://www.ocr.org.uk/qualifications/by-subject/computing/raspberry-pi/

Setup Tutorial

• http://www.youtube.com/user/RaspberryPiTutorials

Links used in this tutorial: Raspberry Pi Operating System Downloads: http://www.raspberrypi.org/downloads Win32DiskImager: https://launchpad.net/win32-image-writer/+download MD5 & SHA-1 Checksum Utility: http://download.cnet.com/MD5-SHA-1-Checksum-Utility/3000-2092_4-10911445.html See http://www.raspberrypi.org/ for more info.

Existing resources

• http://www.raspberrypi.org/resources/teach/
• http://www.raspberrypi.org/resources/make/
• http://www.raspberrypi.org/resources/learn/

More links for Raspberry Pi

• http://pi.cs.man.ac.uk/

• http://elinux.org/Rpi_Education
• http://python4kids.wordpress.com/ - python for kids, raspberry pi, minecraft, etc.