I am currently working on a computer club project for 3-12th grade students. I am hoping to teach the how to download, install and configure Raspberry Pi Desktop on some retired iMac's (21.5 inch, 2014), 1.4ghz i5 with 8gb RAM. They seem to run fairly well, but I have many newbie questions and I am not sure where to ask or find answers. Almost every search gives me results pertaining to actual Raspberry Pi devices, which will be a future project.
So first a general question, where should I be looking for the most helpful support for Raspberry Pi Desktop for Mac?
As I become familiar with this forum should I be asking one specific question per topic? Or is it okay to post a list of questions and hope someone can direct me to the correct documentation or solution.
Rick Davis
{Disclaimer: } Advice offered as a volunteer helper, not for or with the approval of Raspberry Pi themselves.
The Software Download page for that Operating System image says -
Ref: https://www.raspberrypi.com/software/ra ... i-desktop/
Debian with Raspberry Pi Desktop is our operating system for PC and Mac. It provides the Raspberry Pi OS desktop, as well as most of the recommended software that comes with Raspberry Pi OS, for any PC or Apple Mac computer.
If you have an old computer that is no longer powerful enough to run a modern commercial operating system, try Debian with Raspberry Pi Desktop: it can often make the computer usable once more.
So you are installing a fairly basic version of the very widely used Debian Operating System, but with the cosmetic addition of the 'Raspberry Pi' Desktop GUI.
In consequence, the vast majority of your support questions will be generic 'Debian' ones and not specific to this Raspberry Pi. So generic Debian sources of help may be your best resource. You are unlikely to get support for your venture from Raspberry Pi themselves.
Note that at the time of writing the OS image offered by Raspberry Pi is based on Debian Bullseye which was superceded by Debian Bookworm 12 months ago. Raspberry Pi have made no commitment to upgrading their image to Bookworm.
As you have found already, you will need to take care that any information you choose to act on is relevant to Debian running on 'conventional' hardware. (As distinct from The Raspberry Pi Operating System which runs only on Raspberry Pi single board microcomputers.) And also that current information based on Debian Bookworm may not apply to the superceded Bullseye release.
For use of these forums: my preference is for a single question - or group of closely related questions - in a single post. A 'cornucopia' post can rapidly get confusing if it results in multiple spin-off threads focusing on different aspects of the questions raised.
tldr: if you are using iMac hardware it is probably wise to NOT mention 'Raspberry Pi' in your searches. In most cases the specific Desktop interface won't be the critical part of the problem. The rest is plain 'Debian.'
Statistics: Posted by B.Goode — Fri Jun 28, 2024 7:30 am