Technical Coordinator

The ARRL Technical Coordinator (TC) is a section-level official appointed by the Section Manager to coordinate all technical activities within the section.

Technical Coordinator

Technical Specialist

For a section team to be effective in one of the most important arenas in Amateur Radio, technology, there must be a cadre of qualified, competent Technical Specialists (TS).

"Advancement of the radio art" is a profound obligation we incur under the rules of the FCC.

TSes help meet this obligation.

Technical Specialist

TS supports the TC in two main areas of responsibility:
Radio Frequency Interference and Technical Information.

Technical Specialist can specialize in certain specific technical areas, or can be generalists.

http://www.arrl.org/technical-specialist

View the Presentation!

Follow along with the presentation on your personal device!

• Connect to access point: Pi WiFi
• No password. Click through any 'unsecure' messages, ignore 'no internet' messages.
• Open web browser.
• Go to: http://slides.rpi.local
  -or- 192.168.76.1

Slide Navigation

Tablets, Smartphones, Touchscreens:

• Swipe up/down, left/right
• or use the navigation arrows on screen in the lower right.

Laptops, Keyboard:

• Advance to the next slide: press [SPACEBAR].
• Go back to the previous slide: press and hold the [SHIFT] key while pressing the [SPACEBAR].
• Display presentation overview: [ESC] then use the arrow keys or mouse to select a slide. [ESC] again will exit overview mode.

qué es?

The Raspberry Pi is a low cost, credit-card sized computer that plugs into a computer monitor or TV, and uses a standard keyboard and mouse. It is a capable little device that enables people of all ages to explore computing, and to learn how to program in languages like Scratch and Python...

qué es?

...It's capable of doing everything you’d expect a desktop computer to do, from browsing the internet and playing high-definition video, to making spreadsheets, word-processing, and playing games. What’s more, the Raspberry Pi has the ability to interact with the outside world, and has been used in a wide array of digital maker projects.

from: What Is A Raspberry Pi?

Eben Upton, designer of the Raspberry Pi noticed the slide in skill levels while working at Cambridge University's Computer Laboratory in 2006.

Students applying to study computer science had far less experience than previous students.

from: Raspberry Pi for Dummies. img: IBTimes

Eben and his colleagues came up with the idea of creating a computer, that came with necessary tools, sold for $25, was robust enough to survive a children's book bag, that did interesting things, and drew people to use it.

from: Raspberry Pi for Dummies. img: Cambridge Judge Business School

Unintended Consequences

The Raspberry Pi was designed to inspire children to take-up programming, but the vast majority of the £25 computers have been bought by adults.

"The reason we've sold so many of these (over a million) is largely is that they've sold to technology capable adults more than they've sold to kids," Upton said. "We think only 10-20%, maybe 30% of the ones we sold have ended up in the hands of kids."

from: PC Pro

Hardware

img: Raspberry Pi Foundation

Which of the following is true about the Raspberry Pi?

a. has no video output.

b. has no real-time clock.

c. has a small spinning hard drive.

d. randomly blinks Morse Code.

Hardware

• Currently 7 models of Raspberry Pi: A, A+, B, B+, 2, Zero, 3.
• CPU equivalent to the chip used in older smartphones or a Pentium II processor (late '90s).
• Graphics equivalent to the Xbox game console (2001).
• ARM SoC (system on a chip) architecture (tablets & smartphones) which includes: CPU, GPU (graphics), and RAM (256 MB - 1 GB).
• Overclocking (forcing a component to operate faster than the manufactured clock frequency) is built into the operating system and does not void the warranty.

from: Raspberry Pi for Dummies and Wikipedia

Typical connectors

• MicroUSB power.
• 1 - 4 USB connectors.
• Video camera input.
• HDMI, RCA or TRRS (tip, ring, ring, sleeve) on audio port for video out.
• 1/8" audio out.
• SD (Secure Digital) or MicroSD card for storage.
• Ethernet networking port (not "A" boards).
• GPIO (General-purpose input/output).
• Full list of specifications for each model available on Wikipedia.

from: Wikipedia

GPIO

Interface the Pi with your own circuits!

img: DesignSpark

• Headers come in 26 or 40-pin GPIO depending on model.
• First 26 pins are the same.
• General purpose input and output via Broadcom BCM2836.
• I2C is a standard that can talk to other I2C chips (also used in the ID EEPROM).
• SPI is the Serial Peripheral Interface (sensors, LCD).
• UART is Universal asynchronous receiver/transmitter (Serial port).

from: Wikipedia

Operating systems

• Primary operating system is Linux.
• There are many Linux variants (called distributions) available for the Pi.
  Distributions have various programs, software / hardware libraries, and / or package management system installed along with the Linux Kernel.
• Raspbian is the recommended RPi distribution.

What About Windows??

Yep. Wait, what? Yeah, Windows!

Getting started: Required peripherals (and cables)

Required to get started using the Pi.

• Monitor or TV: HDMI or RCA.
• USB keyboard and mouse.
• SD card.
• PC SD card writer.
• MicroUSB power supply or cable.

Getting started: Recommended peripherals (and cables)

Useful when using the Pi.

• USB key or external HDD.
• Speakers.
• Case.
• Network cable or WiFi adapter.

Verified peripherals

Two places for peripherals verified to work with the Raspberry Pi:

• RPi Verified Peripherals
• AdaFruit

Of course, try any peripherals you can dig up first!

Getting started: Prep

• Download a Linux distribution (like Raspbian).

They say beginners should start with NOOBS. Truth is, NOOBS contains the Raspbian distribution with the option to download some other Linux distributions. I say skip it and download Raspbian.

• Download may come as a compressed archive, unzip it. An a ".IMG" is the file type containing the disk image.
• Write the image to the SD card.

Getting started: Booting the Pi

• Insert SD card, connect peripherals (monitor, keyboard, mouse, Ethernet) first.
• Then connect power.
• Raspi-config will assist in setting up your Pi: expanding to use the full SD card size, change password, change locale and time zone, assign memory split between system and GPU, overclock, Secure-Shell Server (SSH), boot to desktop, update.

Desktop apps - Office Suite

sudo apt-get -y install libreoffice

Desktop apps - Web browser

Preloaded with Web (Epiphany). Alternatives:

Chrome:

sudo apt-get -y install chromium

Firefox:

sudo apt-get -y install iceweasel

Desktop apps - Image Editing: Gimp

sudo apt-get -y install gimp

Programming

• Python
• Scratch (kids)

Others?

• Any language which complies on an ARM chip.
• Bash shell scripting
• C/C++
• Java
• Ruby
• Wolfram
• Graphics
• Bare metal

Projects - Usual Linux stuff

The Pi WiFi demo network:

Projects - GPIO Christmas Tree

Great for kids!

from: pocketmoneytronics

Projects: SDR

• Freq Show (RTL-SDR Scanner)
• FM Transmitter
• PiAware (ADS-B Receiver)

Ham Radio Projects: Transmitters

• SkyPi-40
• WSPR Transmitter

Ham Radio Projects: VoIP

D-STAR
• K8JTK DVAP Pi Hotspot
• ThumbDV/PiDV
• DVMega (hotspots, shields)
• Alternative distributions: Western D-STAR
  Maryland D-STAR
  D-STAR Commander

• PiRLP
• Svxlink (EchoLink & Repeater controller)
• Asterisk Allstar

Ham Radio Projects: Apps & Networking

img: AG6QO