Progress on Berry Patch

Progress on Berry Patch:

In the last ten weeks we have managed to obtain thirty-two raspberry pis along with thirty-two SD cards that they will be running off of.  The SD cards have been formatted with copies of raspberry pi number 03 and then renamed appropriately, this reduced the time that it would take to make individual pis and they are also more easily added to the file sharing system.  I have also obtained a series of standoffs to put the pis together so that they will be organized more neatly; however, each pi only takes two standoff so I will need to have a base made which I have and engineering major at the school working on.   I have also decided that it would be preferable to have the pis not run off individual micro usb chargers as having thirty -two of them plugged in at once may cause a fire hazard so I have asked one of the Professors to assist me in creating a power supply for the raspberry pis.  In the mean time I have ordered some additional micro usb chargers so that the cluster could still be expanded, and I have successfully expanded the cluster to sixteen nodes.  I also noticed that when there are sixteen pis on at once they generate some hear, so it may be a good idea to look into getting some form of cooling for the cluster.  I have also obtained the necessary number of Ethernet cables that will be needed to connect all of the raspberry pis to the network.

For next term I hope that I will be able to have all of the pis powered, and make sure that they have all been properly added to the file sharing system.  Furthermore I will need to acquire a suitable stand for the pis.  Then there is the potential problem of heat buildup so again I will need to find a way to cool the pis; likely a few fans will work.IMG_20131121_130111_035IMG_20131125_172148_563