Raspberry Pi Hardware Projects 2

Raspberry Pi is a UK Non Profit with the goal of creating a new generation of computer programmers. Observing how the UK Tech Industry was kickstarted by the availability in the 1980s of relatively cheap, very programmable computers such as the ZX81, the Commodore and the BBC Micro, the Raspberry Pi Foundation designed a £15/$25 computer which encourages the user to play and to learn. Although intended for schools, it has also been adopted by hackers and geeks, and a whole ecosystem of software and hardware is being built around the Pi. With a million boards now sold, the goal of the Foundation is well underway.

Table of Contents:
Introduction 1 CHAPTER 1 Computer-Controlled Slot Car Racing 3 Obtaining a Slot Car Racer 4 Hacking Your Slot Car Racer 4 Testing Your Slot Car Racer Hack 6 Getting the Player Input 7 Making the Joystick Buttons 7 Boxing It Up 12 Joystick Testing 16 The Software 18 The Game 20 Over to You 27 CHAPTER 2 Facebook-Enabled Roto-Sketch 29 The Concept 30 Rotary Encoder Types 30 The Encoder Output 31 Posting to Facebook 40 Using Flickr 40 The Final Roto-Sketch Program 44 Creating a Symmetrical Pattern 50 Over to You 56 CHAPTER 3 The Pendulum Pi, a Harmonograph 59 The Concept 61 The Hall Effect 61 Enter the Arduino 63 Putting It Together 64 Smooth Swinging 69 Electronics 71 Programming the Arduino 76 The Final Arduino Code 81 Programming the Pi 89 Using the Pendulum Pi 94 Over to You   96 APPENDIX A Getting Your Raspberry Pi Up and Running 97 The Operating System 98 Getting the OS on an SD Card 99 Premade Cards  99 Creating Your Own SD Card 100 Connecting Your Raspberry Pi  104 Connecting a Display 106 Connecting via HDMI 107 Connecting via DVI 107 Connecting via VGA 109 Connecting via Composite  109 Connecting to a Network 110 Booting the Operating System 111 Powering Up!  113 The Boot Process 114 Starting the Graphical Desktop 114 Starting a Terminal under X 115 Troubleshooting 115 Common Problems 115 No Lights Come On 115 Only the Red Light Comes On 116 No Monitor Output 116 Intermittent Problems 116 Power Problems 116 If You Need More Help 117 Let the Fun Begin! 118 APPENDIX B Introductory Software Project: The Insult Generator 119 Running Your First Python Program 120 Saving Your Program 123 Generating an Insult 126 Variables 126 Strings 127 Lists 127 Functions 128 Insult Your Friends by Name! 129 Conditional Behaviour 131 Create a Stream of Insults! 131 Making Your Own Functions 131 Creating Loops 132 for Loop 133 while Statement 134 Putting It All Together 135

About the Author :
Dr Andrew Robinson (Manchester, UK) worked at the University of Manchester School of Computer Science, where they have just launched the Great British Raspberry Pi Bake Off, a competition to get people making projects with the Pi. Andrew has quickly become a leading expert on the Pi and its astounding capabilities, including guest posts on raspberrypi.org, the official mouthpiece of Raspberry Pi. He is the creator of PiFace, which makes interfacing with the Raspberry Pi significantly easier. He is currently utilizing the Raspberry Pi as part of the team behind the BBC’s Springwatch. Mike Cook is is the co-author of Raspberry Pi For Dummies. Mike is a veteran tech author and a freelance consultant for all things to do with Physical Computing. A former Lecturer in Physics at Manchester Metropolitan University, he has written more than three hundred computing and electronics articles for the pages of computer magazines since the 1980s. Mike patrols the forums as Grumpy Mike, though he is anything but!