DietPi News – v8.20 released, NanoPi Neo Air handheld Linux terminal

The latest DietPi v8.20 release of the lightweight Debian-based Linux distribution for SBCs and server systems was outed on July 29, 2023, and on a separate note, a DIY handheld Linux terminal based on the NanoPi Neo Air SBC and running DietPi has been found on the interwebs.

DietPi v8.20 release

The project team released the new DietPi v8.20 on July 29th, 2023 with the following highlights:

• Homebridge: New software package bringing Apple Homekit support
• Kernel updates for
  • Pine64 Quartz64  – Linux 6.4.7 and enabled support for the NFS kernel server
  • FriendlyELEC NanoPi R5S/R5C/R6S series – Linux 5.10.160
  • StarFive VisionFive 2 RISC-V SBC – Linux 5.15.123
• WiFi Hotspot: Enhanced DHCP default settings
• Fixes and updates for DietPi-LogClear, DietPi-Dashboard, DietPi-LetsEncrypt, PaperMC, vaultwarden, etc…

The full changelog can be found on the DietPi website and the source code is hosted on GitHub.

NanoPi Neo Air handheld Linux terminal running DietPi

While it’s nice to have an alternative Linux distribution for popular single board computers, it’s great when they are used in specific projects, and Liliputing brought to our attention one of those. Hackaday.io user Balazs has designed a handheld terminal powered by FriendlyELEC NanoPi Neo Air SBC (Allwinner H3) running DietPi interfaces over UART to a Raspberry Pi Pico board driving an 800×480 SPI TFT color display and scanning a 71-key matrix keyboard. The design also includes a DS3231 RTC module and a 10,000mAh LiPo battery providing up to 15 hours of up-time. The terminal supports ASCII, Latin-1 supplement, box drawing, block, braille, and some other characters.

Except for the baseboard, the project is mostly made of off-the-shelf parts. The KiCAD hardware design files, other resources, and instructions can be found on Hackaday.io.

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