What is the pros/cons of using a Raspberry PI (full-blown computer with OS) versus a Microcontroller (minimal, no OS) such as the Arduino platform for a project like this?
I made it on a RaspberryPi because I know Python better than Arduino language (particularly at the time when I started this). However, the hardware benefits of the Arduino are very apparent when connecting switches and things up to the pins. Ardiuno has things like built in pull-up (or down) resistors for digital inputs (eg the flow meter).
An Arduino would be more than capable of running this logic, and an Ethernet one would even be able to log to the website the same as this setup does. However it's been really helpful being able to SSH onto the Pi, and tweak the code around in the environment where it has access to all the inputs. Especially considering that I live over 100 miles away from the installation!
Speaking of which, I might just hop on and run the pump for a bit, why? Just because :)
Most succinct way to explain this: look at manual page section 2 -- you have to do everything in here yourself. Forking, sockets, files, redirection, TCP/IP, device drivers, ELF loading, virtual memory, multitasking/scheduling, loadable modules, etc -- you're on your own. ;)
