The Official Raspberry Pi Beginner's Guide: How to use your new computer

I plan on getting a Raspberry Pi 5 kit for an 11-year-old grandson. He's interested in programming, and his mom has him currently attending a summer camp on the Scratch 3 visual programming language (from MIT). The book has very clear basic explanations of how to set up and use a Raspberry Pi. Even better, Scratch 3 is available as part of the Raspberry Pi OS, and the book gives numerous examples of how to employ Scratch 3 in simple electronic projects. A simplified Python IDE is also available (Thonny), and the book likewise introduces the reader to Python programming and its use in electronic projects in very basic ways (the book doesn't explain it, but if you're more advanced, you can easily install Microsoft's Visual Studio Code on a Raspberry Pi; VS Code is one of the Pi's "recommended software" items). The book concentrates on the Raspberry Pi GUI interface and barely mentions anything about the terminal interface. The "sudo" command is dismissed in a few lines with little more warning than "don't run games under sudo." Apt-get is not mentioned (there is a reason most of us run GUIs on our computers!). Even so, the book is perfect for my grandson. Even though the Raspberry Pi OS doesn't include any provision for parental controls, the book would be even better if the Raspberry Pi Foundation and the author gave some thought to that and recommended the best possibilities to the reader (I doubt his parents want to (or are capable of) disabling DHCP on their router and turning the kid's Raspberry Pi into a DNS server for their home LAN via Pi-hole just to have parental controls on what he's doing -Chromium and Firefox are available as browsers for the Pi, opening up both good and bad horizons for the kid). I highly recommend the book. Even an adult experienced with Unix and Linux will learn interesting and useful things about the Raspberry Pi and the book certainly opens the door to the vast Pi world that's out there.An electronic PDF copy of the book can be found in the Raspberry Pi's Bookshelf directory of a Raspberry Pi 5. The viewer software that comes with the Raspberry Pi is not my favorite PDF reader. Buying a copy of the book, as I have done, helps support the author and the Raspberry Pi Foundation. I am sure my grandson will find a physical copy of the book much more useful than an electronic book that's only available to him without some sleight of hand when he's running his Raspberry Pi.

Perfect for a beginner with Raspberry Pi. Would not recommend for more advanced users.

I was underwhelmed.I suppose it’s ok of you’re doing the standard RP as a newbie’s computer. I’m not doing that.The RP User Forum is a much better source of info, from folks who’ve been around the block…

The only negative is that that the whole book is available for free on the RP5 (electronically). I saw this on Amazon and my wifey pulled the trigger because she thought it would be a nice surprise and it was but be aware, you may already have a copy and not even know.

For someone less than confident about digital kit this guide is brilliant. Clear narrative, very clear photographs and "attack programmes" are combined with a most helpful style of writing/comprehensive detail.What a difference from the usual badly translated Chinese or Taiwanese guides.Well donr!

A little over priced but well thought out book. Worth having as a go to.