[ale] My Raspberry π is here

[mike at trausch.us]

On 10/17/2012 10:11 AM, Derek Atkins wrote:
> "mike at trausch.us" <mike at trausch.us> writes:
> 
>> On 10/16/2012 04:05 PM, Scott Castaline wrote:
>>> Finally got my π today and wifey wasn't here to grill me, so I'm a
>>> very happy camper! Happy, happy, happy! Playtime now begins. Even the
>>> FedEx guy has already been playing with one already.
>>
>> They are wonderful little things.
>>
>> I ordered 5 after last month's meeting so that we could play with them,
>> and I am already looking at putting them to use to solve some
>> long-standing problems that these are just absolutely perfect for solving.
> 
> Okay, what long-standing problems are they absolutely perfect for solving?

#1. I'd like to use it as the new controller for the house security
system.  Our mainboard for the security system (which we don't have
monitoring for) died, and I'm fairly confident that I can use the Rπ to
drive the existing sensors, though I may need to have a board in between
them that converts from 12V or 5V signals to 3.3V ones.  I haven't dug
in just yet to actually figure out the physical details of this security
system.  (Also, there is a board that allows you to hook up Arduino
sheilds to a Rπ, available online; Radio Shack seems to sell a lot of
Arduino stuff, and with such a board, one can easily add GPRS or 3G
connectivity to the Rπ, making it ideal for use in a security
application such as this.)

Plus, then I control the security system, and not some hard-wired logic
or pre-programmed and opaque microcontrollers that ADT installed once
upon a time, and I can add functionality to it, too.

#2. I'd like to use it to interface with ad-hoc circuits to do various
things in my goals learning low-level electronics.  One problem that I
have had is I've been paralyzed by both indecision and ignorance on
this; the Rπ eliminates a lot of that, because there are a lot of GPIO
pins available, and one can use those pins to interface with any sort of
external circuitry.  Plus, I can learn ARM, very inexpensively.

#3. I'd like to install one in the car to log OBD-II readings when we
experience troubles, and I'd like to actually build the thing to do
that.  Not because I can't buy a dongle, because they have OBD-II
dongles that communicate with smartphones via Bluetooth now, but it'd be
a good learning experience, IMHO, and a useful one as well.

#4. I'd like to use them to control relays so that I can forcibly
power-on and power-off things remotely.  This, mostly because the things
I want are either too expensive or too inflexible for my needs.  These
things can allow me to use a custom-written SSH subsystem with key-based
authentication to directly control relays that control AC power, which
is a nifty capability.  Again, more learning that I want to do and not
an unpractical application.

#5. A monitoring dashboard!  This thing hooks up to the TV, and can
output 1920x1080.  A small, DirectFB-based GTK+ application to give me a
ticker and overview of everything I'm responsible for monitoring,
without eating my PC's video real estate?  I think that's an awesome idea.

#6. A MoH system for legacy Avaya Partner systems... which I plan on
only using until I replace the phone system I want to hook it up to...

I'm sure that there are others that I am presently forgetting.  I've had
many ideas for things that start with "If only I had a powerful
enough/flexible enough/inexpensive enough device as a core component for
...".

And obviously, prototyping for other things that I'd rather not use an
Rπ for the production unit, but would want to use an ARM with perhaps
fewer peripherals or a different form factor.  Not all my applications
require USB, or even Ethernet.  Virtually none of the applications I can
think of require analog video output, although many require analog audio
input.

	--- Mike

-- 
A man who reasons deliberately, manages it better after studying Logic
than he could before, if he is sincere about it and has common sense.
                                   --- Carveth Read, “Logic”

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