Programming for an embedded app

Is it possible to booth the system and auto load an executable w/o having to login? I want it to run like an embedded system.

As the Linux or Unix root (super user), edit /etc/rc.local (E.g. `su gedit /etc/rc.local`).  Just before the `exet` statement at the end of the file, this is where you will insert a command to launch whatever it is that you want launched soon after boot time.  Note that rc.local is launched just after all of the other /etc/rcN.d scripts are launched.  For more details about "rc", investigate how Linux boots and how the "init" process (pid 1) works.

You probably do not want your stuff running as the root.  So, in /etc/rc.local, your command should be something like this:

     su -c 'COMMAND' MYUSERID

where

     COMMAND = is the absolute path name to your shell script

     MYUSERID = the user name under which you want COMMAND to run

When I do this, my shell script is always self contained i.e. I do not rely on any I/O redirection of environment variables setup for me.  Also, make sure that you check *every* exit code from any embedded executables or called scripts.

Log to a directory that MYUSERID has write-access to and that will survive a reboot (E.g. do not log to /tmp).  Always include "evidence" with each log entry such process ID, date, time, and context (what was the goal?).  I would write to file names that included the date so that these log files could be aged (yes, you need to write a log-ager).

I want to write the code in my MS Visual C environment. How do I compile it for running on the Raspberry. Do I copy the code on to the SD card and compile and run on the Raspberry?

My understanding that Windows is not yet ready for general-purpose computing on the RPi, just "IoT".  I would stick to Linux and C/C++ programming for Raspbian or one of the Ubuntu flavors.  The Gnu C/C++ compiler works very well for this purpose.  Also, there are other language options such as Java and Python which can handle GPIO.

Good luck and experiment with tools.  Report back!

Is it possible to booth the system and auto load an executable w/o having to login? I want it to run like an embedded system.

As the Linux or Unix root (super user), edit /etc/rc.local (E.g. `su gedit /etc/rc.local`).  Just before the `exet` statement at the end of the file, this is where you will insert a command to launch whatever it is that you want launched soon after boot time.  Note that rc.local is launched just after all of the other /etc/rcN.d scripts are launched.  For more details about "rc", investigate how Linux boots and how the "init" process (pid 1) works.

You probably do not want your stuff running as the root.  So, in /etc/rc.local, your command should be something like this:

     su -c 'COMMAND' MYUSERID

where

     COMMAND = is the absolute path name to your shell script

     MYUSERID = the user name under which you want COMMAND to run

When I do this, my shell script is always self contained i.e. I do not rely on any I/O redirection of environment variables setup for me.  Also, make sure that you check *every* exit code from any embedded executables or called scripts.

Log to a directory that MYUSERID has write-access to and that will survive a reboot (E.g. do not log to /tmp).  Always include "evidence" with each log entry such process ID, date, time, and context (what was the goal?).  I would write to file names that included the date so that these log files could be aged (yes, you need to write a log-ager).

I want to write the code in my MS Visual C environment. How do I compile it for running on the Raspberry. Do I copy the code on to the SD card and compile and run on the Raspberry?

My understanding that Windows is not yet ready for general-purpose computing on the RPi, just "IoT".  I would stick to Linux and C/C++ programming for Raspbian or one of the Ubuntu flavors.  The Gnu C/C++ compiler works very well for this purpose.  Also, there are other language options such as Java and Python which can handle GPIO.

Good luck and experiment with tools.  Report back!