Hardware Reference
In-Depth Information
The text reveals some of the work the OS is doing. You may see messages as the various driv-
ers are loading, such as the keyboard driver, sound driver and network driver. After the driv-
ers have loaded, the OS runs any startup programs and displays the login prompt.
By default, the username is
pi
and the password is
raspberry
.
Type
pi
and press Enter.
Now type
raspberry
and press Enter. Linux doesn't display anything when you type pass-
words, which can be a bit unfamiliar if you are used to other OSs.
You should see the command line prompt, where you can type commands and run programs.
In the next section, you're going to start the program that allows you to use the Raspberry Pi
graphically.
Starting the Graphical Desktop
If you are familiar with Windows or OS X, you are used to a friendly graphical desktop that
is loaded automatically with icons you can click. On the Raspberry Pi, however, in order
to show that a graphical desktop doesn't have to be integral to a computer, it isn't loaded
automatically.
To start the graphical display on the Raspberry Pi, type
startx
.
After a few seconds the X server will start, and you will be able to use a graphical desktop. If
you can see the Raspberry Pi logo in the background, then congratulations - you have suc-
cessfully connected your Raspberry Pi! he projects in this topic assume that you're starting
from here, with the desktop displayed.
The X Server
The design of Linux means that the graphical desktop runs on top of the OS as a separate
program called the
X server
. This opens up additional possibilities, such as controlling one
computer with the display being shown on another computer over a network connection.
This means that you can control the Raspberry Pi without having a monitor plugged into it,
which is useful if you put it in a remote location.
