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I think the "spirit" of the RPi is what encourages this hacker/maker mentality....which is perfectly fine by me.

joezydeco 6y ago
Funny. I thought the original spirit of RPi was to be a BBC Micro to a new generation of schoolkids and let them explore a modern desktop programming system for cheap. The "let's hack this into a Beowulf cluster!" stuff was secondary. Now it seems to be primary and the education stuff is, um, not even mentioned anymore?
- pjmlp 6y ago
  It is still mentioned, in the context of UK education.
- mikepurvis 6y ago
  The education market may have been seen as larger and more "addressable" when this was all in the planning stages.
- iNate2000 6y ago
  This is what happens when you let people explore something for cheap: they do all kinds of things you didn’t expect. The outcome couldn’t have been better.
  - HeyLaughingBoy 6y ago
    This is exactly it. There's a group of guys I build hardware/firmware for. They are experienced engineers, but their expertise is in machine tools. We met because they made a post on an Arduino forum a few years ago basically saying "we need to do X. We know it has to be possible in a cost-effective way because of all the cheap Arduino, Raspberry Pi, etc. hardware we keep seeing for sale but we don't have any experience on those platforms. Can anyone help us?" This illustrates a point that a lot of people don't see: while Arduino or RPi were released for a specific purpose, the absolutely massive ecosystem that grew up around them enabled a slew of entirely new classes of applications that weren't feasible before due to cost. Back to "my" guys. If I quoted them an upfront design for what they needed, starting from scratch, it would have reached into the five figures easily. Instead I was able to say "hey, I'm working on something that has a lot in common with that. I'll build you a prototype of what you need for the cost of the hardware" and we went from there. Now that project makes me a few $k per year.
- bityard 6y ago
  > Now it seems to be primary and the education stuff is, um, not even mentioned anymore? Except at the very top of the website?
- ashika 6y ago
  i think it still is that, but achieves it so easily as to be unremarkable. rpi has probably introduced many people to linux and debian. it might seem trivial, but anything that gives ordinary people a good experience with open computing should be considered a massive victory.

Funny. I thought the original spirit of RPi was to be a BBC Micro to a new generation of schoolkids and let them explore a modern desktop programming system for cheap. The "let's hack this into a Beowulf cluster!" stuff was secondary. Now it seems to be primary and the education stuff is, um, not even mentioned anymore?

pjmlp 6y ago
It is still mentioned, in the context of UK education.
mikepurvis 6y ago
The education market may have been seen as larger and more "addressable" when this was all in the planning stages.
iNate2000 6y ago
This is what happens when you let people explore something for cheap: they do all kinds of things you didn’t expect. The outcome couldn’t have been better.
- HeyLaughingBoy 6y ago
  This is exactly it. There's a group of guys I build hardware/firmware for. They are experienced engineers, but their expertise is in machine tools. We met because they made a post on an Arduino forum a few years ago basically saying "we need to do X. We know it has to be possible in a cost-effective way because of all the cheap Arduino, Raspberry Pi, etc. hardware we keep seeing for sale but we don't have any experience on those platforms. Can anyone help us?" This illustrates a point that a lot of people don't see: while Arduino or RPi were released for a specific purpose, the absolutely massive ecosystem that grew up around them enabled a slew of entirely new classes of applications that weren't feasible before due to cost. Back to "my" guys. If I quoted them an upfront design for what they needed, starting from scratch, it would have reached into the five figures easily. Instead I was able to say "hey, I'm working on something that has a lot in common with that. I'll build you a prototype of what you need for the cost of the hardware" and we went from there. Now that project makes me a few $k per year.
bityard 6y ago
> Now it seems to be primary and the education stuff is, um, not even mentioned anymore? Except at the very top of the website?
ashika 6y ago
i think it still is that, but achieves it so easily as to be unremarkable. rpi has probably introduced many people to linux and debian. it might seem trivial, but anything that gives ordinary people a good experience with open computing should be considered a massive victory.