Now, Raspberry Pi’s are in my opinion not only the easiest way to get into coding (because I don’t really code) but also the best possibility to just have fun and be creative, since there are nearly no boundaries.

Maybe you agree, maybe you have already bought a Raspberry, made a plan and thought about execution – but how in the world do I get this thing to work?!?

It’s actually quite simple…

1. Get a micro SD-Card (ca. 16 GB)
2. Download Noobs
3. Extract the Noobs ZIP-file
4. Copy/Paste everything from the unzipped file onto your SD-Card
5. Put your SD-Card into the Raspberry
6. Connect your Raspberry to power and peripherals
7. BOOM – It’s booting

Now you’re theoretically done…
But to get an easy start into the world of Raspberries here is the full tour.

Once your Pi is booting you are being greeted by this little welcoming screen:

Just go through with the set-up process as one would do with any other new device and then we’re going to start our first jerney into the terminal.

Once you went through the standard setup process, open the terminal in the top left corner.
We’ll open the Raspberry configuration file by typing:

sudo raspi-config

“sudo” hereby makes use of your admin rights and you should generally use it before any other command.
“raspi-config” is the Raspberry configuration file:

Now we’ll go down to “Interfacing Options”, press enter, select SSH and activate it.
SSH is a tool that allows you to remotely use your Raspberry’s terminal via your computer, so you don’t have to have dedicated peripherals for your Pi afterwards.

After activating SSH, you’ll be brought back to the configuration file, where we will once again select “Interfacing Options”, but select “VNC” this time and activate it.
VNC-Viewer is a set of programs I use as a companion to ssh – just in case the terminal suddenly decides to use another language and I don’t know what’s going on anymore.
It configures your Pi as a type of server that you can access and view all it’s outputs as if your Computer were a display.

When you’ve finished all this and are again in the configuration file, just select <Finish> and since we’re already in the terminal, type in

sudo reboot

which will obviously reboot your Pi.

Now it’s time to head over to your computer.

Here we will first install VNC-Viewer which will let you connect to the VNC-Server tool that we have activated on your Raspberry and Angry IP Scanner which will scan your network for IP addresses.
You will need this scanner a TON since you need an IP address to connect to your Pi in any way or form.

After installing these programs you’ll have to go through the VNC-Viewer set-up process first during which you will also have to create an account.

When all this is done: CONGRADS!
You can now control your Pi remotely.
But…

First of all, VNC is a great tool which I use religiously when working with Pi, but it can sometimes be quite slow and multitasking isn’t one of its specialities.

And that’s why we have activated SSH.
Connecting to your Pi via SSH will give you direct access to its terminal, which is much more convenient.

In order to use ssh, you first have to open your terminal and type the following:

ssh pi@192.168.2.XXX

By doing so you are logging into your Raspberry as the user “pi” at (@) the IP-address XXX.

Now we’re at the end, but let me just give you an overview of what we did:

• We opened the Raspberry configuration file.
• activated VNC and SSH
• installed VNC and Angry IP Scanner on your computer
• logged into VNC
• and connected via SSH

That’s it.
You are now up and running and ready to start your first Raspberry Pi project.

You may want to read my guide on The Most important Linux commands and what they do in order to get an overview of what your little device is capable of.

But other than that, I am done here and can only wish you good luck!

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