The GPIO (General Purpose Input/Output) pins of the Raspberry Pi are how the device can interface with external hardware components. It is how things like sensors and actuators plug into the Raspberry Pi, and allow users to control such devices from the Raspberry Pi itself. Something as simple as turning an LED on or off will require setting the pin to which it is plugged in to either true
or false
, which changes the current status of that pin.
Hardware
Introduction to LVM thin provisioning
LVM (Logical Volume Manager) is a technology which allow us to create a layer of abstraction over physical storage devices, and implement flexible partitioning schemes where logical volumes are easier to shrink, enlarge or remove than classical “bare” partitions. While LVM “thick” provisioning requires the allocation of a fixed amount of storage space to a LVM logical volume at creation time, by using “thin” provisioning, storage is allocated only when needed.
Working with RAM Disk Devices in Linux
Linux users and system administrators alike are always trying to squeeze as much performance as possible out of their system. A big bottleneck for system performance frequently comes from file transfer speeds – that is, system read and write times. Although recent disk technology like SSDs (Solid State Drives) and NVMe (Non Volatile Memory Express) have sped up transfer times significantly over traditional hard drive disks, none can measure up to the speedy performance of a RAM disk.
How to check power consumption on Raspberry Pi
As you can probably guess just from its small size and light weight, the Raspberry Pi does not use a lot of power. While it is nice to know that your Raspberry Pi will not be adding much onto your electric bill, exactly how much power does it actually consume? This can be tricky to answer and we need to rely on external devices, since power consumption can’t be accurately measured from software alone.
Top Raspberry Pi Alternatives for Your Needs
When it comes to single board computers, the Raspberry Pi is probably the most popular and well known choice in the field. But it is far from the only contender. Depending on your needs for a small sized computer, there are multiple alternatives that you can consider, some of which may fit your purpose even better than the Raspberry Pi.
How to check Wi-Fi adapter and driver on Raspberry Pi
The newer models of the Raspberry Pi come with a built in Wi-Fi chip that allow them to connect to wireless networks. It is possible to obtain information about the Wi-Fi adapter, including the driver and its current version. In this tutorial, you will see how to check the Wi-Fi adapter, driver, and other pertinent Wi-Fi hardware information on a Raspberry Pi.
How to check CPU temperature on Raspberry Pi
It is always a good idea to keep an eye on the temperature of your Raspberry Pi’s CPU. Although this small processor packs a punch for its size, it is important to remember that it does not have a fan or any other cooling ability by default. That means that if the processor is constantly working hard, CPU temperatures could get high and eventually damage the device.
How to enable ZRAM on Raspberry Pi
Most Linux systems tend to use a little bit of storage on the hard drive as swap space, where temporary files can be stored by the system and then easily recalled later. This speeds up operations, without needing to take up any space inside of the physical memory (RAM). On a Raspberry Pi, this same convention can prove problematic due to the majority of devices relying on an SD card as the primary (or only) storage device.
How to check USB devices on Raspberry Pi
Since the Raspberry Pi is frequently accessed remotely, such as through an SSH or VNC connection, we can’t always take a peek at the device to see which USB devices are physically connected to it. Furthermore, it can be useful to query the USB ports from the system itself, just to see if the devices or connections are actually being detected. In this tutorial, you will see how to check the USB devices that are connected to a Raspberry Pi.
Raspberry Pi 4 enable/disable Bluetooth
Newer Raspberry Pi models such as the Raspberry Pi 4 come with Bluetooth capabilities built in. To get started using Bluetooth on your Raspberry Pi, you will have to make sure that the service is enabled. This allows the device to utilize the Bluetooth hardware to connect to peripheral devices like mice, keyboards, and headphones. If you are not planning to use Bluetooth, then you may want to keep it disabled in order to minimize unnecessary overhead. In this tutorial, you will see how to enable or disable Bluetooth on the Raspberry Pi model 4.
How to check temperature on Raspberry Pi
Although the Raspberry Pi is small, it packs a lot of power into that small space. When doing intensive tasks, the Raspberry Pi can generate too much heat, and it does not come with a fan to help keep the temperature down. For this reason, it is important to keep an eye on your Raspberry Pi’s temperature to make sure it does not get too hot and risk damaging components. Furthermore, the Raspberry Pi will not perform up to par if it needs to throttle itself to keep temperatures down.
How to change keyboard layout on Raspberry Pi
In this tutorial, you will see how to change the keyboard layout on your Raspberry Pi. This will allow you to access all of the necessary characters available in the language of your desire, as well as give you an opportunity to switch between a QWERTY or other type of keyboard layout. We will assume that you are using the official Raspberry Pi OS, from which the keyboard layout can be configured via both command line and GUI.