Preface

The Raspberry Pi is a small form factor, single board, ARM-based computer. It is capable of running on many desktop applications that can be run on a standard Linux computer. While the Pi is only slightly larger than a credit card, it uses very little power. As such, it has become very popular among the hacker and maker community, which uses the Pi to integrate more computing power in their projects.

The Pi is very easy to set up and in less than 20 minutes, you can run it on a modified version of popular, Linux-based operating systems. It will function just like you would expect a desktop PC to. Thanks to its small form factor, many people have used it as an alternative to a traditional PC for fast access to applications and the Internet. Since the Pi draws very little power, it can be left running.

Where the Pi really excels is that it brings more computing power to hardware and electronics projects. This is made possible by a wide range of interfaces on the Pi that are typically not found on conventional computers.

This has led to a rise in new projects that are made using the Pi, which otherwise would have been considerably more difficult or expensive to make.