The nature of the Raspberry Pi is such that it has something of value for a wide range of people, whether you are interested in the hardware, or the software. Like the Arduino, it has lowered the barrier of entry for hardware, but one of the key aspects is the ease with which one can get software for these platforms.
What both these platforms have done is to create a basic hardware profile, for which developers can create all sorts of software. There are now dozens of Linux distros available for the Raspberry Pi, many of them specialized for things such as retro gaming, torrent server, media centre etc.
The creators of the Raspberry Pi have now simplified acquiring software even more with the launch of an official Raspberry Pi store. The Pi Store—as it is called—has been launched in collaboration with IndieCity and Velocix and will offer a wide range of software for the Pi. Currently the selection includes a number of software titles under the categories of Games, Apps, Tutorials, Dev Tools, and Media.
The Pi Store has also been integrated with the official Raspberry Pi Linux “Raspbian” based on Debian “wheezy”. For existing Raspberry Pi users that already have it installed on their device, the procedure getting the store is as simple as running the following command:
sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install pistore Of course since it is a store, it is possible to publish your own software there which in turn can be installed by Raspberry Pi users. Currently there are a number of popular free and open source applications available on the store, such as LibreOffice, and Asterisk (a popular open source software for IP PBX, IVR etc.) It is also possible to charge for content, but even if you don’t there is a tip jar feature that allows people to pay whatever they feel like.
The store isn’t restricted only to applications, it can host images, audio, video and other kinds of content. The MagPi magazine for Raspberry Pi is available on the store for example.
If you were thinking of creating any kind of content catering to Raspberry Pi users, this seems like a nice place to host it and hopefully make some money in the process.
You can visit the Raspberry Pi store at store.raspberrypi.com
