Next Steps
Raspberry Pi Projects
Chapter 7 — Further Resources and Where to Go Next
What You Have Built
Over the first six projects you have turned a single-board computer into a genuinely useful piece of infrastructure — a web server, a network-wide ad blocker, a media server, a secure VPN gateway, a smart home hub, and a physical computing platform. Each project stands alone, but they are also designed to talk to each other:
Project 1
Web Server
Project 2
Pi-hole
Project 3
Media Server
Project 4
VPN Server
Project 5
Home Assistant
Project 6
GPIO / Physical
Combining the Projects
The real power emerges when you connect the projects together. Here are some ideas that build on what you have already set up:
🌡 Smart home weather station
Wire a DHT22 (Project 6) to a dedicated Pi Zero, log readings to MQTT, and display them on a Home Assistant dashboard (Project 5). Add weather forecast cards from the Met.no integration and you have a fully local weather station with no cloud dependency. Publish the dashboard on your web server (Project 1) for a public-facing display.
Project 1Project 5Project 6
🎬 The ultimate media night
When Jellyfin (Project 3) starts playing, a Home Assistant automation (Project 5) dims the Hue lights, pauses the robot vacuum, and silences Sonos. When the film ends, everything reverts. Add Pi-hole (Project 2) to your VPN (Project 4) so your phone gets ad-free browsing even when you're away from home.
Project 2Project 3Project 4Project 5
🔒 Away-from-home monitoring
Connect a PIR motion sensor and door contact (Project 6) to Home Assistant (Project 5). When you're away, the automation sends a push notification to your phone. Connect via WireGuard (Project 4) to check your Jellyfin library or Pi-hole stats remotely. Everything is served over HTTPS through your web server (Project 1).
Project 1Project 4Project 5Project 6
🌱 Automated greenhouse / grow tent
Use a DHT22 for temperature and humidity, a soil moisture sensor, and a relay module (Project 6) to control a fan, heater, and grow light. Publish all sensor data to Home Assistant (Project 5) for history graphs and alerts. Set schedules with the timed relay pattern and automate watering when soil moisture drops below a threshold.
Project 5Project 6
Official Documentation
Raspberry Pi Documentation
The official Pi docs covering hardware, OS, GPIO, cameras, and more. Regularly updated and thorough. The best first stop for any Pi question.
Pi-hole Documentation
Comprehensive docs for Pi-hole — configuration, blocklists, FTLDNS, regex blocking, and the REST API for automation.
Jellyfin Documentation
Full guide to Jellyfin — library management, hardware transcoding, networking, plugins, and the API. Covers all client apps.
WireGuard Official Site
The WireGuard homepage includes the whitepaper, quick-start guide, and cross-platform installation instructions. The whitepaper is surprisingly readable.
Home Assistant Documentation
Excellent, thorough docs for every integration, automation feature, and configuration option. The integrations catalogue alone is worth bookmarking.
gpiozero Documentation
The official gpiozero docs with full API reference, recipes for dozens of components, and a brilliant "source and values" guide to understanding the library's design.
Project-Specific Deeper Dives
Web Server (Project 1)
Apache HTTP Server Docs
The full Apache manual. Covers virtual hosts, mod_rewrite, .htaccess, SSL, performance tuning, and security hardening in depth.
Certbot (Let's Encrypt)
Instructions for every server/OS combination. Covers auto-renewal, wildcard certificates, and DNS-01 challenges for servers without port 80.
Nginx as an Alternative
Nginx is a popular Apache alternative — lighter and faster as a reverse proxy. Worth exploring once you are comfortable with Apache basics.
DuckDNS Setup Guide
Step-by-step guide to running the DuckDNS update script on a Pi, including the cron job for automatic IP updates.
Pi-hole (Project 2)
The Firebog — Blocklist Collection
A curated, regularly updated collection of Pi-hole blocklists, organised by category (ads, tracking, malware, suspicious). The "ticked" lists have low false-positive rates.
Pi-hole + Unbound
Run your own recursive DNS resolver alongside Pi-hole — queries are resolved directly with the root servers rather than forwarded to a third party like Cloudflare or Google.
Pi-hole Admin Interface (GitHub)
The source for Pi-hole's web admin. The wiki covers all API endpoints — useful if you want to query Pi-hole stats from scripts or Home Assistant.
r/pihole
An active subreddit with blocklist recommendations, whitelisting advice, and help with tricky configurations. Good for "this broke, why?" questions.
Media Server (Project 3)
HandBrake
Free, open-source video transcoder. Use it to convert your media to H.264/AAC so Jellyfin can direct play without transcoding on the Pi. The "Fast 1080p30" preset is a great starting point.
Jellyfin Client Apps
Official download page for all platforms — Android, iOS, Apple TV, Roku, Fire TV, Kodi plugin, and desktop apps. Also links to Swiftfin and other community clients.
Jellyfin Plugin Cataloguejellyfin.org
Community plugins for Jellyfin — anime metadata providers, missing episode tracking, intro skipper, and more. Access from Administration → Plugins.
Jellyfin Plugin Catalogue
Official plugin index — intro skipper, open subtitles, Anime metadata, Fanart provider, and more. Install directly from Administration → Plugins in the dashboard.
WireGuard VPN (Project 4)
WireGuard Whitepaper
The original academic paper. Short (only 12 pages), readable, and explains the cryptographic design clearly. Worth reading once you have the VPN running.
PiVPN
A guided installer script that sets up WireGuard (or OpenVPN) with a simple wizard and adds a
pivpn command for managing clients. A good alternative to manual setup.
Tailscale
A managed WireGuard overlay network. If you find manual WireGuard configuration complex, Tailscale handles key exchange automatically — install and go.
Algo VPN
An Ansible-based VPN setup tool. More complex than PiVPN but produces a very security-hardened WireGuard or IKEv2 server. Suited to those with some sysadmin experience.
Home Assistant (Project 5)
HACS — Home Assistant Community Store
Hundreds of community integrations, dashboard cards, and themes not in the official store. Essential once you've mastered the basics.
Home Assistant Community Forum
The most active HA help community. Search before posting — virtually every common problem has already been solved here. The "Share your Projects" section is inspiring.
r/homeassistant
Large, active subreddit with dashboard showcases, automation ideas, and troubleshooting help. Great for inspiration and seeing what others have built.
Jinja2 Templating in HA
The key to powerful automations. Jinja2 templates let you do maths, string manipulation, and conditional logic in your automation conditions and actions.
GPIO & Physical Computing (Project 6)
pinout.xyz — Interactive GPIO Reference
Click any pin to see what it does, which protocols it supports, and example code. Also runs on the Pi itself: install with
pip3 install pinout and run pinout in the terminal.
Raspberry Pi Official Projects
Dozens of step-by-step Pi projects from the Raspberry Pi Foundation — from beginner LED circuits to machine learning camera projects and Minecraft integrations.
Adafruit Learning System — Pi Tutorials
Adafruit's tutorials are among the best written in the electronics space. Covers every sensor and display they sell, all with Python code and clear wiring diagrams.
Electronics Tutorials
If you want to understand the electronics — not just the code — this site explains resistors, transistors, capacitors, and circuit theory from first principles.
YouTube Channels
These channels consistently produce high-quality Raspberry Pi and home lab content:
NetworkChuck
Energetic tutorials on networking, home servers, VPNs, and Pi projects. Great for visual learners — he builds everything live on camera.
Pi-holeWireGuardLinuxNetworking
Techno Tim
Home lab focused — Kubernetes, Docker, self-hosting, and home automation. Production-quality videos with written guides on his website to follow along.
Home AssistantSelf-hostingDocker
Everything Smart Home
Home Assistant focused — integrations, automations, dashboard design, and device reviews. Particularly good for Zigbee and Z-Wave device setup.
Home AssistantZigbeeAutomations
Learn Linux TV
Linux system administration clearly explained — server setup, Bash scripting, and services. Good companion for the server-side projects in this course.
LinuxServersApacheBash
ExplainingComputers
Christopher Barnatt's channel — thoughtful, well-researched videos on Pi hardware, accessories, and computing concepts. The Pi hardware comparison videos are excellent.
Pi hardwareGPIOReviews
KronosMac / CrossTalk Solutions
Home lab and self-hosting deep dives — Jellyfin, WireGuard, reverse proxies, and Proxmox. Methodical and thorough.
JellyfinWireGuardSelf-hosting
Community and Help
Raspberry Pi Forums
The official forums — active, friendly, and moderated. A great place for hardware questions and anything specific to Raspberry Pi OS.
r/raspberry_pi
One of the largest Pi communities — project showcases, questions, and news. The wiki has answers to the most common beginner questions.
r/selfhosted
The self-hosting community — covers everything from Jellyfin and Home Assistant to email servers and cloud replacements. The wiki has a curated list of self-hosted alternatives to popular services.
r/homelab
Home lab enthusiasts — hardware setups, networking, virtualisation, and server projects. Good for seeing where a Pi home server might grow into something bigger.
Stack Overflow — Raspberry Pi tag
For programming questions — Python GPIO code, errors, library issues. The Pi tag has hundreds of answered questions covering gpiozero, RPi.GPIO, and more.
Home Assistant Discord
Real-time chat with the HA community — faster than forums for quick questions. Separate channels for automations, integrations, and the lovelace dashboard.
Recommended Books
| Title | Author | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Raspberry Pi Cookbook (4th ed.) | Simon Monk | Broad collection of Pi recipes — networking, GPIO, sensors, displays. Great for dipping in and out. |
| Programming the Raspberry Pi (3rd ed.) | Simon Monk | Python on the Pi from scratch — covers GPIO, gpiozero, and physical projects clearly. Good for beginners. |
| Make: Electronics (3rd ed.) | Charles Platt | Hands-on electronics from first principles — no prior knowledge assumed. Best read alongside Project 6. |
| The Linux Command Line (2nd ed.) | William Shotts | Comprehensive Bash and Linux reference. Free to read online at linuxcommand.org/tlcl.php. |
| Automate the Boring Stuff with Python | Al Sweigart | Practical Python — web scraping, file handling, scheduling, and automation. Free at automatetheboringstuff.com. |
Where to Buy Components
Pimoroni
UK-based. Excellent Pi accessories, HATs, sensors, and starter kits. Fast UK shipping and good documentation for everything they sell.
The Pi Hut
UK-based. Wide range of Pi hardware, cases, HATs, and components. Good for official accessories and starter kits.
Adafruit
US-based (ships internationally). The best range of sensors, displays, and breakout boards, all with excellent tutorials.
SparkFun
US-based. Similar to Adafruit — great for breadboarding components, motor drivers, and educational kits.
AliExpress
Very cheap components direct from manufacturers. Excellent for bulk orders of LEDs, resistors, relay modules, and sensors. Slow shipping (2–4 weeks).
Amazon
Convenient for quick delivery. Search for "Raspberry Pi starter kit" for a cost-effective bundle of common components.
Ideas for What to Build Next
Raspberry Pi Projects — Complete
7 chapters · 6 hands-on projects · osztromok.com
Chapter 1Web Server
Chapter 2Pi-hole
Chapter 3Media Server
Chapter 4VPN (WireGuard)
Chapter 5Home Assistant
Chapter 6GPIO & Sensors