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Having Fun With PowerBook Motion Sensors

Posted by Zonk on from the twist-and-shout dept.

mjk325 writes "Amit Singh has published a discussion on the 'Sudden Motion Sensor' feature in the latest revision PowerBooks. One utility he has released displays a 3-D view of the PowerBook that follows the actual movement of the physical machine. Another utility creates windows that rotate in opposite directions to the physical machine to appear always straight. My brand new PB has the motion sensor, but apparently the utilities work on any system using software faking."

21 of 81 comments (clear)

  1. Sweet. by Protoclown · · Score: 4, Funny

    This is cool enough to make me want a PowerBook.

  2. Security? by caerwyn · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Seems like this could be used to implement some sort of security feature. Turn on a utility, and when significant movement is detected the computer could send out a signal- in the form of activating an attached alarm, taking a picture with a webcam and emailing it, etc etc. When the owner returns, the utility could be quickly turned back off.

    --
    The ringing of the division bell has begun... -PF
    1. Re:Security? by Pirogoeth · · Score: 5, Interesting

      How about a security feature where besides entering a password, you need to tip your PB around in a certain pattern before it will unlock?

      --
      Happiness is like peeing yourself. Everybody can see it but only you can feel its warmth.
    2. Re:Security? by servognome · · Score: 5, Funny

      you need to tip your PB around in a certain pattern before it will unlock?
      You know everybody will set their pattern to Up-Up-Down-Down...

      --
      D6 63 0D 70 89 81 BB 8E 7B 7C 5F 5D 54 EA AB 73
  3. No imagination by wowbagger · · Score: 4, Funny

    Obviously, you all have no imagination.

    What is clearly needed is a plug-in that clears the screen when the unit is held upside-down and shaken!

    Or a version of Marble Madness that uses the tilt of the machine to control the marble.

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    www.eFax.com are spammers
    1. Re:No imagination by wowbagger · · Score: 5, Funny

      Or, now that I think about it, a flying game wherein the tilt of the laptop controls the yoke of the aircraft - imagine the fun of sitting in a cybercafe holding your Powerbook in your hands and going "Vrroommm! PowPowPow!"

      Or rather, the fun of watching somebody else doing that....

      --
      www.eFax.com are spammers
    2. Re:No imagination by ameline · · Score: 3, Interesting

      You (and the moderators too) think you're joking. But I'm not. If, and as soon as, that capability is available in any widespread manner on a tablet PC (or a, purely hypothetical, tablet mac), Alias Sketchbook will exploit it in the way you describe. (There will probably be a preference to turn it off and/or adjust it's sensitivity. Wouldn't want it to happen accidentally.) Cheers

      --
      Ian Ameline
  4. Physical Tilt Games... by fracai · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Tilt games using ball bearings need to be developed as soon as possible to make use of this.

    The pBook is light enough to make it feasible for a little while anyway. My only concern would be causing the drive heads to park to often due to "agressive" playing. The article implies that you can disable the head parking, but then I'd be worried about disk damage.

    I wonder what the threshold is for head parking?

    --
    -- i am jack's amusing sig file
    1. Re:Physical Tilt Games... by mmkkbb · · Score: 5, Informative

      There already is such a game. It is called Neverball

      --
      -mkb
    2. Re:Physical Tilt Games... by Steve+Cowan · · Score: 4, Insightful

      If I was physically tilting and jostling my PowerBook to play a silly little game I would probably want to park the hard drive anyway, and keep it parked until the game ends.

      Pinball, anyone?

  5. Re:imac 2 by mmkkbb · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Do you remember the Radius Pivot?

    --
    -mkb
  6. for geologist out there by cassidyc · · Score: 4, Funny

    Just stick one on the ground and wait for earthquakes, who needs all that specialist equipment

    CJC

  7. Thinkpad by Vaystrem · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I own a Thinkpad T41 which has this feature. One of the coolest things, to my friends, is that you can set the applet, which monitors harddrive shocks, to display the laptop in real time. It doesn't display vertical movement, however, it will show you flipping it upside-down, angling it in any direction, etc. It is pretty neat.

  8. Etch-A-Sketch! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Finally! My Powerbook can be an etch-a-sketch. You could even get two of these for the knobs, if you're really into it...

  9. Is your desktop perturbed? by lpangelrob2 · · Score: 3, Funny
    That Perturbed Desktop application is the funniest thing I've ever seen.

    In spite of the author's quote, "Needless to say, it is quite a hellish experience trying to use the computer in this manner," it's just asking for someone to install it on some poor clod's computer, getting him drunk, and then have him try to do something productive like code in Perl.

    "Hey... WTF does an upside down exclamation point stand for?"

    --
    -Rob
    Marriage doesn't have to suck!
  10. Whoa! by CaycePollard · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Just checked this out on my Al 15 1.67 and it's so cool it superconducts.

    This is the first piece of software that's had me drop my jaw for ages. Well done. I swear I will pay good money for the first "shake the machine and the window clears" etch-a-sketch plug-in for Pages or Keynote :)

  11. Acceleration Detector + GPS = differential GPS by kris_lang · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Hmmm... differential GPS just depends on having a local waypoint to give you a very accurate position, beyond the 1-3 meter resolution of GPS.

    Now why not keep track of the accelerations, integrate (SUM) over time to get the velocity, integrate once again to get the spatial location. You could keep a log of where the laptop goes while it's on. Hmm... I might have to buy one of these toys, make the software and put it in the passenger seat of my car and see what I can make it do...

    I remember a circuit cellar article about a 3-d accelerometer, but I didn't feel like dinking around with a soldering iron that year. Looks like a new powerbook will let me accomplish that long-delayed task with software alone.

    Must acquire cash for purchase NOW :)

  12. Don't worry, you don't need a powerbook by exp(pi*sqrt(163)) · · Score: 3, Interesting

    You can build something like this for any laptop. The parts would be something like a USB module like this ($20 unless you're happy just using a regular serial port), an Atmel AVR microcontroller (this ($30 for the development board which is easier to use than just the component). The accelerometer outputs a pulse with a width that varies linearly with acceleration you can just write a simple loop on the AVR (using avr-gcc) to count the pulse length and then report back via the USB (or serial port). Total cost: probably well under $100 including building an AVR programmer.

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  13. Re:Recalibrating? by adjusting · · Score: 5, Funny

    Put a book under one leg of your desk?

  14. Personal Experiment... by DoctaBu · · Score: 5, Interesting

    If anybody is interested, I have recorded a video of the rotation of the two programs on the website.

    You will notice that with the StableWindow, sometimes its a bit off, and with the AMSVisualizer, the Y-axis animations seem to be backwards. But, who cares? It's neat anyway.

    PowerBook Tilting!

  15. The ultimate application of a notebook acceleromet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Set aside an ungodly huge frame buffer, and move the notebook around like it's a tiny window into another dimension. Imagine having a rendevous moment where you have to walk across the street to retrieve a stray iChat window. You might even want to upgrade to WiFi with triangulation, then everybody's notebook could share this "framebuffer dimension" If you put your notebook back to back with somebody else's and read their screen backwards! Don't forget to have a well firewalled desktop, preferably with a brick tile ;)

    See also: Croquet