PiCast Offers Chromecast Functionality for Raspberry Pi

Much has been made about Google's $35 Chromecast dongle, which lets users stream their desktops and video to large screen TVs, but there is now a similar application for the Raspberry Pi that offers some of the same functionality: PiCast. Its developer has an informational page up here, where he notes:  "I thought what do I have that I could use w/HDMI [licensing] and wouldn't be terribly hard to do? My Arduino? Nope BUT my Raspberry Pi can do it all, literally and [at the] same price as the Chromecast."

You can watch PiCast in action here.  Essentially, you install the required software on the Raspberry Pi, and then you can send video and other content found online through the Pi to a TV. The project is early in development, but there is a GitHub repository here. 

The PiCast's developer notes on his information page that he isn't very happy that the Chromecast device from Google isn't open. He intends to keep PiCast completely open and optimized for Raspberry Pi.

As we've reported many times, the Raspberry Pi has emerged as one of the biggest open source stories anywhere. It's attracted all kinds of developers and tinkerers, is now running many different flavors of Linux, and there is even now a supercomputer consisting of many Pi devices lashed together with Lego pieces.

You can also read about musical and home security applications for the Pi in this post.