Arduino vs Raspberry PI

Hope you're not suggesting that a person should always adjust their problem to fit a preferred or familiar solution. Somehow, I seem to start with "what's my power requirement?" then move on from there.

Mind you, I am a bit like colporteur but must be further down that path of keep it simple because that's all my grey matter can handle. So I tend to start with an MCU and stick with that unless it's absolutely necessary to switch to a more complex MPU.

Simple is ideal!

As a College instructor, I would advise students assigned projects to design the minimum to meet requirements. Adding enhancements to improve the wow factor of the project was good if you delivered on the requirements. Just getting a project to meet the requirements got you full marks. Not meeting the requirements but having lots of bells and whistles earned you disappointment.

Complexity is mentally inefficient. It takes up mental capacity that could be used to store other stuff, like why did I go to the basement. As I furthered my career I had more and more stuff to retain. There was an professional expectation and much more a personal expectation that you could recall the what and why you had done something.

I found a drawing the other day on created  some twenty years ago on DS1 signals. The drawing was motivated by needing to retain how DS1 signal were created from an analogue signal and then multiplexed into larger and larger signal. The drawing is simple. I can look at it and recall the problem and the solution.

Indeed so. I've learnt a few fundamentals over the years... For example, when you don't understand something fully you'll tend to over complicate matters and then create new jargon to try and explain what's going on. Then when put under pressure you'll grab the best thing you can find (like a sledgehammer) to solve the problem you don't fully understand (like cracking a nut) and then spend as much time as you can planning and over engineering the problem solving process (usually involves plenty of plans/presentations and project management reports) to make sure no one has spotted the bluff.

But, like you say, every now and then you create something called art, which when you look at again years later is a simple easy to understand masterpiece.

Indeed so. I've learnt a few fundamentals over the years... For example, when you don't understand something fully you'll tend to over complicate matters and then create new jargon to try and explain what's going on. Then when put under pressure you'll grab the best thing you can find (like a sledgehammer) to solve the problem you don't fully understand (like cracking a nut) and then spend as much time as you can planning and over engineering the problem solving process (usually involves plenty of plans/presentations and project management reports) to make sure no one has spotted the bluff.

But, like you say, every now and then you create something called art, which when you look at again years later is a simple easy to understand masterpiece.