![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 | → | Archive 5 |
Seems to resemble Beagleboard quite a lot, just in a smaller form factor. Is it based on the same OMAP CPU? The specs seem quite similar. Panu-Kristian Poiksalo ( talk) 09:40, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
Does it have network/internet connectivity? I don't see it mentioned either way and it a pretty crucial feature of a modern computer Back ache ( talk) 15:55, 19 July 2011 (UTC)
The article currently states The prototype is designed on a Broadcom processor 2763 but this piece claims the 2835 (apparently derived from the 2722). As the info is officially unknown (and perhaps incorrectly reported) maybe it should be removed from the article here, pending confirmation. -- Trevj ( talk) 06:04, 1 August 2011 (UTC)
I am considering adding a paragraph about licensing. The software part is easy, but there are some unanswered questions about the hardware:
Is the hardware under some sort of free / open source / creative commons license or is it proprietary?
Is the Raspberry Pi Foundation asserting that the hardware in under patent protection? I am assuming not - nothing there appears patentable.
Is the Raspberry Pi Foundation asserting that the schematics and board layout are under copyright protection?
Have they published the schematics or board layout? If not, do they assert that the schematics or board layout are under trade secret protection?
Is the Raspberry Pi Foundation asserting that the name and logo are under trademark protection? Have they ever used the TM mark? Have they gone farther and registered the name/logo and used the (R) mark? I would be very surprised if those are not trademarks, whether or not they mark them as such (and it is normal practice for FOSS projects to retain trademark rights). Guy Macon ( talk) 09:49, 11 October 2011 (UTC)
The FAQ at http://www.raspberrypi.org/?page_id=8 mentions that the product is scheduled for release in nov/dec. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.12.201.202 ( talk) 07:23, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
You are invited to join the discussion at
File talk:Raspberry Pi Logo.svg#Contested deletion.
Trevj (
talk)
07:30, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
This addition to the table has been reverted with the summary Revert: Every language with an ARM port will work on Raspberry Pi. We're not going to enumerate them all. Why not? Although other hardware within Category:Single-board computers doesn't list languages, I believe the Raspberry Pi to be fundamentally different in that it's intended to encourage programming. The interview with David Braben is presented in a reliable source. Does anyone other than me think it's valid to include 'Programming languages' in the table (with more languages to be added in the future)? I can't see anything at WP:NOT suggesting the exclusion of such material. Is the removal of this content justified by any policy? Thanks. -- Trevj ( talk) 14:47, 9 December 2011 (UTC)
People who say that BBC BASIC is obsolete and listing it would put "undue weight" on it do not grasp the (historical) significance of providing BBC BASIC, in a way it is the singular programming language for the Raspberry PI !
The reason that BBC BASIC has that status is because in Britain (the raspberry PI was created for the British educational market) it was the foremost language used in education in the 80's, and this system is more or less a "remake" of such a "learn to program computer".
Another reason for the BBC computer's historical significance is that the creators of the BBC computer (Acorn) also designed the ARM processor architecture that is used in the Raspberry PI.
If you read the "mission statement" of the raspberry PI foundation, [8], and some of the interviews and such it is clear that a longing for the days that all British children were exposed to programming on the BBC computer with BBC BASIC directly lead to the wish to create this educational computer, cheap enough to give away to all British school children to give them back the direct exposure to programming that we do not have anymore in schools these days.
Obviously using the same language as a previous generation learnt programming with is more or less a prerequisite "to put the fun back in programming". Programming in BBC BASIC is fun because BBC BASIC has a high turnaround rate because its an interpreter, not a compiler. So you can type in a few lines of code and run it immediately. Also because its such a clean and simple programming environment it doesn't distract from the basis of learning to program.
Its not meant for "getting work done", but meant for "getting to know how computers work" in a fun way.
Mahjongg ( talk) 19:48, 9 December 2011 (UTC)
I've tidied up by removing a number of these. Remember this is a wiki, those aren't appropriate external links for this article. If someone wants info on ARM11 (say) they don't come here, they go to that article. Similarly if someone has started here and wants more detail on ARM11, they follow that wikilink and that contains the pertinent resources... -- 62.254.139.60 ( talk) 14:25, 1 January 2012 (UTC)
Arduino most certainly does reference the datasheets for its major ICs.
has a link to
http://www.atmel.com/dyn/products/product_card.asp?PN=ATmega328P
Which is the overview of the Atmel ATmega328P.
The "Documents" tab on that page leads to
which has a link to
http://www.atmel.com/dyn/resources/prod_documents/doc8271.pdf
(If a manufacturer has an overview page that links to the datasheet, it is better to link to that than to link directly to a large PDF.)
A Raspberry Pi is like an Arduino, Beagleboard, or Pandaboard, and is not like a PC, Macintosh or Commodore 64. Those are general purpose computers -- the point of the PC. etc. is running apps (even though you can hack them). The point of the Arduino, etc. is educational hardware hacking and software hacking (even though you can run apps on most of them). The audiences for the two classes of product are completely different, and thus the Wikipedia pages should have different emphasis.
You may be surprised that a proposal to treat an educational bare board computer like a general purpose computer is controversial, but it is very controversial. -- Guy Macon ( talk) 16:04, 2 January 2012 (UTC)
It seems there is a bit of a confusion on the wording of "pin header connectors". A "header", without the word "pin", or "connector" is mainly used for a software construction, like a header of an e-mail, it is not normally used to describe a hardware connector. A "header connector" can be either a pin header, or the band-cable connector connected to a (boxed) pin header. It is also sometimes used for a "female pin header", that is a header without pins, but female receptacles instead of pins. Googling for pictures using "header connector" will normally produce "pin headers", except for the few cases where the header happens to be a female header. Headers are also normally associated with connectors, while pin headers can also be used for jumpering. On the raspberry PI the 2.54 millimeter spaced rows of holes are obviously intended for the male version of header connectors, thus "pin header connector" seems the description most fit. The first description also just mentioned "pins". Mahjongg ( talk) 22:13, 10 January 2012 (UTC)
Lol, I have been reading other wiki articles of Raspberry Pi copies/clones such as the BeagleBoard etc and none of them have a 'shortcomings' section and don't believe that the Raspberry Pi needs one either. Twobells ( talk) 17:11, 1 December 2011 (UTC)
A reception section would have to neutral and be based on reliable sources reviewing the product, but so far none have been shipped to be reviewed. Shortly after the first boards ship would be an ideal time to research and write such a section. -- Guy Macon ( talk) 02:10, 29 December 2011 (UTC)
The article RISC OS is stating that Raspberry Pi supports or supported Risc OS, but in this article it states that it's unsupported. I didn't read the articles fully but it looks like contradictory information. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.180.57.12 ( talk) 11:39, 10 January 2012 (UTC)
I have removed RISC OS from the infobox. The infobox and "specification" sections should agree, but they didn't. The "specification" section omitted RISC OS and footnoted some background. I don't care either way, but it's confusing for a new reader to see inconsistency in these lists. -- Ds13 ( talk) 23:24, 23 January 2012 (UTC)
Following a review of the article, which followed a reversed edit of a paragraph I deleted, I believe the sources cited throughout are very close to the subject, and thus do not give a balanced or neutral POV. Please comment herein. Regards. Lynbarn ( talk) 00:22, 7 February 2012 (UTC)
Wikipedia is not a crystal ball. We need to stop putting claims like "Scheduled for introduction in November 2011" (now "updated" to "Scheduled for public release in January 2012", and due for the next "update" in a couple of days). WP:SPECULATION is quite clear: "Individual scheduled or expected future events should only be included if the event is ... almost certain to take place." It is time to stop playing Whac-A-Mole with these predictions and to start reporting things only after they actually occur, like we did with the eBay auction. Other speculation that should be removed include statements such as "shipping versions are planned to be credit card sized." If a prototype was built and it was the size of a credit card, report that, but don't speculate on the size of what will eventually ship. Likewise, "KOffice and Python are bundled with the Raspberry Pi" is something that may change, so we should not include speculation about it.
There are some things that are almost certain to be true about the boards when they ship and thus can be included in the article. One example: "It does not have a built-in hard disk drive, instead relying on an SD card for long-term storage." There is a vanishingly small chance that between now and when the boards ship the design will change to use a hard disk instead of a SD card, so it's OK to say that "It does not have a built-in hard disk drive."
Let's take out the speculation and report only verifiable events that have already happened or are almost certain to happen, and let's report only features that are known to be on prototypes, reporting them as "the prototype has..." if they may change. -- Guy Macon ( talk) 18:56, 30 January 2012 (UTC)
User Lynbarn has twice and user Macon once deleted notable and well sourced material that I wrote and that user Sbmeirow restored the first time. Tom Morris in protecting the page refers to "unsourced/badly sourced" material, but every sentence has a precise citation to 4 independent sources, all of whom corroborate the others. Lynbarn claims that the material may be unreliable because one of the 4 sources uses a pseudonym on the R-Pi forum, and that R-Pi forum members are not neutral third parties. But this is the pot calling the kettle black. Lynbarn is an unabashed cheerleader for the R-Pi foundation. His user page says: "I discovered a fantastic British computing initiative with massive potential - the Raspberry Pi Foundation." He himself is one of the R-Pi forum's top posters, with 159 posts as of today. He acts as a self-appointed R-Pi forum administrator, dispatching suspected trolls. [1] User Lynbarn apparently feels it is his role to keep the wikipedia article the way the R-Pi publicist would want it. He raised the issue on the R-Pi forum, and the R-Pi publicist Liz, wife of the R-Pi ceo, responded: "Very pleased to see that Lynbarn has taken out some of the references to this forum, which were being used as source material; I'm a Wikipedia editor myself, and I'd have stomped all over it if it was on an entry I was allowed to edit!" [2]It seems Lynbarn is doing the dirty work that Liz is unable to do herself as a representive of the R-Pi Foundation. Liz and Lynbarn use the excuse that references to the forum should not be used as source material, on the presumption that forum poster would be too close to the R-Pi, and therefore biased in its favor. And in fact two of the sources do work for Broadcom, the R-Pi's close partner and SoC supplier, and the other two are enthusiastic supporters. But their words were being used not as puffery or cheerleading for the R-Pi, but to temper and balance the R-Pi foundation's fundamental claim that the device is intended for, and is suitable for, developing software, particularly Python software, on the device itself. In a recent published interview, R-Pi trustee David Braben is quoted as saying: "The Raspberry Pi Foundation hopes to offer children (of all ages), the opportunity to learn hands-on computing skills by creating software on the low cost, credit-card sized device." Perhaps the Broadcom empoyee was exagerating when he said it took 5 hours on a R-Pi to compile an app that took only 10 minutes to compile on his PC. The app's own users's guide says it should only take 5 minutes to build on a "P4 1.7Ghz/512 Mb." But it is unlikely he would be exaggerating in the opposite direction, trying to make the R-Pi look worse than it actually is. So Lynbarn should be happy about any possible insider bias in this case, not afraid of it.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.211.206.238 ( talk) 17:53, 11 February 2012 (UTC)
Just my two cents, but 224 MB (256BM - 32MB for a video framebuffer) should be plenty for a rudimental OS (based on the Linux kernel and X-windows) and a (Python) compiler. The reason its not running (fast) now is that they are probably running it on a complete unmodified Linux distro with all the overhead, using so much memory that the system is forced to use virtual memory, and virtual memory on a SD-card is bound to be extremely slow, even when the system supports faster (non SPI) I/O with the SD-card, swapping will take ages. Recent Linux distro's are simply not "lean and clean" enough for these kind of systems anymore, except perhaps for special implementations like puppy linux that do not use a large and memory hungy desktop manager like GNOME. I predict that a reasonable python implementation will run fine on the Raspberry, if they simply only implement the software that is really necessary, leaving out all the unnecessary cruft. Modern programmers are simply spoilt with resources. It can't hurt to learn them from the beginning to be a bit more frugal. Mahjongg ( talk) 01:27, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
I am on a hot project right at the moment and don't have the time to give it my full attention, but I do intend to analyze this and weigh in on the content dispute. Right now I am supporting neither side. In particular I want to examine the sourcing before I express an opinion. If everybody involved would re-read WP:RS and WP:V, that would be a big help.
I do have time to chip around the edges a bit while waiting for a test run to be set up, so let me comment on some side issues.
First, could we all please indent properly and sign our comments? Just look at what you are replying to, count the colons(":") at the start, and use one more colon. Then end the comment with four tildes ("~"). Thanks!
Second, don't make assumptions about how people will use the Raspberry Pi. For example, I am very likely to be using it headless - no monitor or keyboard, running a single embedded program. I have several uses where an Arduino is not quite powerful enough and I want to replace a 100Mhz 486DX system with 64MB of RAM with something modern.
Third, be careful about speculations on what the RP is likely to be able to do. Read the section above about crystal balls again. In particular, I would like to respond to the above comment "...to temper and balance the R-Pi foundation's fundamental claim that the device is intended for, and is suitable for, developing software, particularly Python software, on the device itself." Wrong, wrong wrong! This is a completely wrong kind of thinking. We are not to "balance" the claims of the RPF. If they claim it cures cancer, we simply report that they claimed that. If some other reliable source claims that the cancer claim is wrong, we report that as well. We don't say whether or not the claim is true.
Fourth (and I haven't dug into the details, I am just responding to a couple of things that caught my eye in the comments above) blogs and online discussions are not as a rule considered to be reliable sources. Again please study WP:RS. -- Guy Macon ( talk) 06:42, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
Yes, I did twice revert a section of text from this article, and I gave what I consider to be two reasonable and reasoned explanations for the reversals. I did not break the WP:3RR rule, so I was (As far as I am concerned) perfectly justified in making those reversions. I have also made other changes, in an attempt to improve the standard of the article (in Wikipedia terms, using the MoS and other wiki resources as my guide) to make it into a more general enclopedia article. I still believe that the article relies too much on a small number of sources, including the Raspberry Pi Foundation's own forum (more of that in a moment). It was not and is not my intention to make the article biased for or against the project, but to make it wikipedia standard-compliant, neutral, informative and generally of interest. Wikipedia is not the personal fiefdom of the editors, and I welcome all those who like me, wish to improve the quality of this and any other article.
It was also I who requested that the article be semi-protected, and I gave a reason. A wikipedia Admin reviewed my request, and acted accordingly, In truth, I was surprised he protected the page for a full month, as I had expected perhaps a week, to protect the article and give an opportunity for myself and others to continue the tidying exercise.
There are a number of comments in the text above which relate personally to me, and I will therefore address them accordingly:
x = 9999999
for i in range(1, x): (
Mahjongg:
you can get even a mainframe grinding to a halt with this "program" if you add a few digits to the x= assignment)
if x % i == 0:
print i
![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 | → | Archive 5 |
Seems to resemble Beagleboard quite a lot, just in a smaller form factor. Is it based on the same OMAP CPU? The specs seem quite similar. Panu-Kristian Poiksalo ( talk) 09:40, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
Does it have network/internet connectivity? I don't see it mentioned either way and it a pretty crucial feature of a modern computer Back ache ( talk) 15:55, 19 July 2011 (UTC)
The article currently states The prototype is designed on a Broadcom processor 2763 but this piece claims the 2835 (apparently derived from the 2722). As the info is officially unknown (and perhaps incorrectly reported) maybe it should be removed from the article here, pending confirmation. -- Trevj ( talk) 06:04, 1 August 2011 (UTC)
I am considering adding a paragraph about licensing. The software part is easy, but there are some unanswered questions about the hardware:
Is the hardware under some sort of free / open source / creative commons license or is it proprietary?
Is the Raspberry Pi Foundation asserting that the hardware in under patent protection? I am assuming not - nothing there appears patentable.
Is the Raspberry Pi Foundation asserting that the schematics and board layout are under copyright protection?
Have they published the schematics or board layout? If not, do they assert that the schematics or board layout are under trade secret protection?
Is the Raspberry Pi Foundation asserting that the name and logo are under trademark protection? Have they ever used the TM mark? Have they gone farther and registered the name/logo and used the (R) mark? I would be very surprised if those are not trademarks, whether or not they mark them as such (and it is normal practice for FOSS projects to retain trademark rights). Guy Macon ( talk) 09:49, 11 October 2011 (UTC)
The FAQ at http://www.raspberrypi.org/?page_id=8 mentions that the product is scheduled for release in nov/dec. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.12.201.202 ( talk) 07:23, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
You are invited to join the discussion at
File talk:Raspberry Pi Logo.svg#Contested deletion.
Trevj (
talk)
07:30, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
This addition to the table has been reverted with the summary Revert: Every language with an ARM port will work on Raspberry Pi. We're not going to enumerate them all. Why not? Although other hardware within Category:Single-board computers doesn't list languages, I believe the Raspberry Pi to be fundamentally different in that it's intended to encourage programming. The interview with David Braben is presented in a reliable source. Does anyone other than me think it's valid to include 'Programming languages' in the table (with more languages to be added in the future)? I can't see anything at WP:NOT suggesting the exclusion of such material. Is the removal of this content justified by any policy? Thanks. -- Trevj ( talk) 14:47, 9 December 2011 (UTC)
People who say that BBC BASIC is obsolete and listing it would put "undue weight" on it do not grasp the (historical) significance of providing BBC BASIC, in a way it is the singular programming language for the Raspberry PI !
The reason that BBC BASIC has that status is because in Britain (the raspberry PI was created for the British educational market) it was the foremost language used in education in the 80's, and this system is more or less a "remake" of such a "learn to program computer".
Another reason for the BBC computer's historical significance is that the creators of the BBC computer (Acorn) also designed the ARM processor architecture that is used in the Raspberry PI.
If you read the "mission statement" of the raspberry PI foundation, [8], and some of the interviews and such it is clear that a longing for the days that all British children were exposed to programming on the BBC computer with BBC BASIC directly lead to the wish to create this educational computer, cheap enough to give away to all British school children to give them back the direct exposure to programming that we do not have anymore in schools these days.
Obviously using the same language as a previous generation learnt programming with is more or less a prerequisite "to put the fun back in programming". Programming in BBC BASIC is fun because BBC BASIC has a high turnaround rate because its an interpreter, not a compiler. So you can type in a few lines of code and run it immediately. Also because its such a clean and simple programming environment it doesn't distract from the basis of learning to program.
Its not meant for "getting work done", but meant for "getting to know how computers work" in a fun way.
Mahjongg ( talk) 19:48, 9 December 2011 (UTC)
I've tidied up by removing a number of these. Remember this is a wiki, those aren't appropriate external links for this article. If someone wants info on ARM11 (say) they don't come here, they go to that article. Similarly if someone has started here and wants more detail on ARM11, they follow that wikilink and that contains the pertinent resources... -- 62.254.139.60 ( talk) 14:25, 1 January 2012 (UTC)
Arduino most certainly does reference the datasheets for its major ICs.
has a link to
http://www.atmel.com/dyn/products/product_card.asp?PN=ATmega328P
Which is the overview of the Atmel ATmega328P.
The "Documents" tab on that page leads to
which has a link to
http://www.atmel.com/dyn/resources/prod_documents/doc8271.pdf
(If a manufacturer has an overview page that links to the datasheet, it is better to link to that than to link directly to a large PDF.)
A Raspberry Pi is like an Arduino, Beagleboard, or Pandaboard, and is not like a PC, Macintosh or Commodore 64. Those are general purpose computers -- the point of the PC. etc. is running apps (even though you can hack them). The point of the Arduino, etc. is educational hardware hacking and software hacking (even though you can run apps on most of them). The audiences for the two classes of product are completely different, and thus the Wikipedia pages should have different emphasis.
You may be surprised that a proposal to treat an educational bare board computer like a general purpose computer is controversial, but it is very controversial. -- Guy Macon ( talk) 16:04, 2 January 2012 (UTC)
It seems there is a bit of a confusion on the wording of "pin header connectors". A "header", without the word "pin", or "connector" is mainly used for a software construction, like a header of an e-mail, it is not normally used to describe a hardware connector. A "header connector" can be either a pin header, or the band-cable connector connected to a (boxed) pin header. It is also sometimes used for a "female pin header", that is a header without pins, but female receptacles instead of pins. Googling for pictures using "header connector" will normally produce "pin headers", except for the few cases where the header happens to be a female header. Headers are also normally associated with connectors, while pin headers can also be used for jumpering. On the raspberry PI the 2.54 millimeter spaced rows of holes are obviously intended for the male version of header connectors, thus "pin header connector" seems the description most fit. The first description also just mentioned "pins". Mahjongg ( talk) 22:13, 10 January 2012 (UTC)
Lol, I have been reading other wiki articles of Raspberry Pi copies/clones such as the BeagleBoard etc and none of them have a 'shortcomings' section and don't believe that the Raspberry Pi needs one either. Twobells ( talk) 17:11, 1 December 2011 (UTC)
A reception section would have to neutral and be based on reliable sources reviewing the product, but so far none have been shipped to be reviewed. Shortly after the first boards ship would be an ideal time to research and write such a section. -- Guy Macon ( talk) 02:10, 29 December 2011 (UTC)
The article RISC OS is stating that Raspberry Pi supports or supported Risc OS, but in this article it states that it's unsupported. I didn't read the articles fully but it looks like contradictory information. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.180.57.12 ( talk) 11:39, 10 January 2012 (UTC)
I have removed RISC OS from the infobox. The infobox and "specification" sections should agree, but they didn't. The "specification" section omitted RISC OS and footnoted some background. I don't care either way, but it's confusing for a new reader to see inconsistency in these lists. -- Ds13 ( talk) 23:24, 23 January 2012 (UTC)
Following a review of the article, which followed a reversed edit of a paragraph I deleted, I believe the sources cited throughout are very close to the subject, and thus do not give a balanced or neutral POV. Please comment herein. Regards. Lynbarn ( talk) 00:22, 7 February 2012 (UTC)
Wikipedia is not a crystal ball. We need to stop putting claims like "Scheduled for introduction in November 2011" (now "updated" to "Scheduled for public release in January 2012", and due for the next "update" in a couple of days). WP:SPECULATION is quite clear: "Individual scheduled or expected future events should only be included if the event is ... almost certain to take place." It is time to stop playing Whac-A-Mole with these predictions and to start reporting things only after they actually occur, like we did with the eBay auction. Other speculation that should be removed include statements such as "shipping versions are planned to be credit card sized." If a prototype was built and it was the size of a credit card, report that, but don't speculate on the size of what will eventually ship. Likewise, "KOffice and Python are bundled with the Raspberry Pi" is something that may change, so we should not include speculation about it.
There are some things that are almost certain to be true about the boards when they ship and thus can be included in the article. One example: "It does not have a built-in hard disk drive, instead relying on an SD card for long-term storage." There is a vanishingly small chance that between now and when the boards ship the design will change to use a hard disk instead of a SD card, so it's OK to say that "It does not have a built-in hard disk drive."
Let's take out the speculation and report only verifiable events that have already happened or are almost certain to happen, and let's report only features that are known to be on prototypes, reporting them as "the prototype has..." if they may change. -- Guy Macon ( talk) 18:56, 30 January 2012 (UTC)
User Lynbarn has twice and user Macon once deleted notable and well sourced material that I wrote and that user Sbmeirow restored the first time. Tom Morris in protecting the page refers to "unsourced/badly sourced" material, but every sentence has a precise citation to 4 independent sources, all of whom corroborate the others. Lynbarn claims that the material may be unreliable because one of the 4 sources uses a pseudonym on the R-Pi forum, and that R-Pi forum members are not neutral third parties. But this is the pot calling the kettle black. Lynbarn is an unabashed cheerleader for the R-Pi foundation. His user page says: "I discovered a fantastic British computing initiative with massive potential - the Raspberry Pi Foundation." He himself is one of the R-Pi forum's top posters, with 159 posts as of today. He acts as a self-appointed R-Pi forum administrator, dispatching suspected trolls. [1] User Lynbarn apparently feels it is his role to keep the wikipedia article the way the R-Pi publicist would want it. He raised the issue on the R-Pi forum, and the R-Pi publicist Liz, wife of the R-Pi ceo, responded: "Very pleased to see that Lynbarn has taken out some of the references to this forum, which were being used as source material; I'm a Wikipedia editor myself, and I'd have stomped all over it if it was on an entry I was allowed to edit!" [2]It seems Lynbarn is doing the dirty work that Liz is unable to do herself as a representive of the R-Pi Foundation. Liz and Lynbarn use the excuse that references to the forum should not be used as source material, on the presumption that forum poster would be too close to the R-Pi, and therefore biased in its favor. And in fact two of the sources do work for Broadcom, the R-Pi's close partner and SoC supplier, and the other two are enthusiastic supporters. But their words were being used not as puffery or cheerleading for the R-Pi, but to temper and balance the R-Pi foundation's fundamental claim that the device is intended for, and is suitable for, developing software, particularly Python software, on the device itself. In a recent published interview, R-Pi trustee David Braben is quoted as saying: "The Raspberry Pi Foundation hopes to offer children (of all ages), the opportunity to learn hands-on computing skills by creating software on the low cost, credit-card sized device." Perhaps the Broadcom empoyee was exagerating when he said it took 5 hours on a R-Pi to compile an app that took only 10 minutes to compile on his PC. The app's own users's guide says it should only take 5 minutes to build on a "P4 1.7Ghz/512 Mb." But it is unlikely he would be exaggerating in the opposite direction, trying to make the R-Pi look worse than it actually is. So Lynbarn should be happy about any possible insider bias in this case, not afraid of it.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.211.206.238 ( talk) 17:53, 11 February 2012 (UTC)
Just my two cents, but 224 MB (256BM - 32MB for a video framebuffer) should be plenty for a rudimental OS (based on the Linux kernel and X-windows) and a (Python) compiler. The reason its not running (fast) now is that they are probably running it on a complete unmodified Linux distro with all the overhead, using so much memory that the system is forced to use virtual memory, and virtual memory on a SD-card is bound to be extremely slow, even when the system supports faster (non SPI) I/O with the SD-card, swapping will take ages. Recent Linux distro's are simply not "lean and clean" enough for these kind of systems anymore, except perhaps for special implementations like puppy linux that do not use a large and memory hungy desktop manager like GNOME. I predict that a reasonable python implementation will run fine on the Raspberry, if they simply only implement the software that is really necessary, leaving out all the unnecessary cruft. Modern programmers are simply spoilt with resources. It can't hurt to learn them from the beginning to be a bit more frugal. Mahjongg ( talk) 01:27, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
I am on a hot project right at the moment and don't have the time to give it my full attention, but I do intend to analyze this and weigh in on the content dispute. Right now I am supporting neither side. In particular I want to examine the sourcing before I express an opinion. If everybody involved would re-read WP:RS and WP:V, that would be a big help.
I do have time to chip around the edges a bit while waiting for a test run to be set up, so let me comment on some side issues.
First, could we all please indent properly and sign our comments? Just look at what you are replying to, count the colons(":") at the start, and use one more colon. Then end the comment with four tildes ("~"). Thanks!
Second, don't make assumptions about how people will use the Raspberry Pi. For example, I am very likely to be using it headless - no monitor or keyboard, running a single embedded program. I have several uses where an Arduino is not quite powerful enough and I want to replace a 100Mhz 486DX system with 64MB of RAM with something modern.
Third, be careful about speculations on what the RP is likely to be able to do. Read the section above about crystal balls again. In particular, I would like to respond to the above comment "...to temper and balance the R-Pi foundation's fundamental claim that the device is intended for, and is suitable for, developing software, particularly Python software, on the device itself." Wrong, wrong wrong! This is a completely wrong kind of thinking. We are not to "balance" the claims of the RPF. If they claim it cures cancer, we simply report that they claimed that. If some other reliable source claims that the cancer claim is wrong, we report that as well. We don't say whether or not the claim is true.
Fourth (and I haven't dug into the details, I am just responding to a couple of things that caught my eye in the comments above) blogs and online discussions are not as a rule considered to be reliable sources. Again please study WP:RS. -- Guy Macon ( talk) 06:42, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
Yes, I did twice revert a section of text from this article, and I gave what I consider to be two reasonable and reasoned explanations for the reversals. I did not break the WP:3RR rule, so I was (As far as I am concerned) perfectly justified in making those reversions. I have also made other changes, in an attempt to improve the standard of the article (in Wikipedia terms, using the MoS and other wiki resources as my guide) to make it into a more general enclopedia article. I still believe that the article relies too much on a small number of sources, including the Raspberry Pi Foundation's own forum (more of that in a moment). It was not and is not my intention to make the article biased for or against the project, but to make it wikipedia standard-compliant, neutral, informative and generally of interest. Wikipedia is not the personal fiefdom of the editors, and I welcome all those who like me, wish to improve the quality of this and any other article.
It was also I who requested that the article be semi-protected, and I gave a reason. A wikipedia Admin reviewed my request, and acted accordingly, In truth, I was surprised he protected the page for a full month, as I had expected perhaps a week, to protect the article and give an opportunity for myself and others to continue the tidying exercise.
There are a number of comments in the text above which relate personally to me, and I will therefore address them accordingly:
x = 9999999
for i in range(1, x): (
Mahjongg:
you can get even a mainframe grinding to a halt with this "program" if you add a few digits to the x= assignment)
if x % i == 0:
print i