Your Computer Isn't Yours

Re:Your Computer Isn't Yours by mikepurvis on Friday November 13, 2020 @10:00AM (#25082917)

I too have doubts about the real-world suitability of the Raspberry Pi in formal education environments, but certainly the business of resetting it _is_ a solved problem; every kid is issued their own SD card, and can flash it back to the starting image whenever they want.

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Re:Your Computer Isn't Yours by greyhair on Friday November 13, 2020 @04:06PM (#25087498)

It all depends on what you want to learn.

On a RPi, with a standard laptop on the side (Windows/Mac/Linux, doesn't matter), and some basic installed tools, you can pull down and configure Alpine Linux and run a bare bones IoT Linux platform. If you want to get really gritty, you also configure and build U-Boot as a primary loader.

Once you get passed that point, you pull docker into your Alpine build and start running containers.

Stepping through that full process will teach you research (because you are going to be reading a lot about how to pull that off), it will teach you about Linux kernel configuration. It will teach you to be at least comfortable with git.

There is a lot you can learn on a Raspberry Pi, cheaply, that only involves plugging in an ethernet port and power supply, and never seeing anything on a terminal.

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