Ever taken apart a mouse? The buttons are just simple pushbutton switches. You want a paddle keyer, just solder wires to the switch inside your mouse and there you go! I designed this for the lowest common denominater, a simple pushbutton switch. If you can connect a swich in parallel with your mouse button, you can still use your mouse as normal with two extra wires running out the back. -pehr
I have developed a GPL'd morse code interface for a linux shell. Please download it and try it out!
http://pehr.net/morseall
I would love to get more feedback on this so that I can make it more usefull. This is intended to be a complete user interface controlled by a single mouse button.
Send me email if you need help setting it up. I have someone working on documentation and want to make this an open-source application of the highest quality!
This sounds like a job for http://www.troubleshooters.com Troubleshooting follows a general problem solving process, which makes any intractible problem look like debugging a program. There is always a place to start. You never have to feel overwhelmed. And basically you know that there are a million other troubleshooters out there who are on your side all the way.
If you are looking for more specific references on wiring computers for kids and schools, there is a new initiative directed at getting better software into schools called. http://www.openclassroom.com
This is really a worthwhile ambition. Good luck! (and remember, the computer is your friend...)
Exchange has the ability (or so I've heard) to export a web-viewable format for the proprietary features.
I use exchange with the Netscape client and someday hope to have access to the closed calenderingsystem through the web. It is not worth your salary to suffer under Outlook, knowing that your mail is stored locally (and on the server) in a closed, proprietary format. In other words, if you are an outlook & exchange user you have *no* unmitigated access to your data (other than through untrusted executables, ie outlook & exchange).
The Blackberry unit is available from http://www.Wyndtell.com It is a re-branded RIM (Research In Motion) pager using the Mobitex (formerly from Ericsson) from Bellsouth. Service is pretty broad, and includes most metropolitan areas.
I have one and it works great. Just call them up and tell them to set it to use your actual email address as the reply-to addr for messages. They'll complain about how this breaks the self-configuration features of the device, but you don't need those features anyway.
Then, set your normal email account to additionally forward messages to your Wyndtell email address. You get messages in both places, and when you reply your reply address is the same!!!
I hope the Palm VII works as well as the Wyndtell RIM pager because I hate having to re-enter email addresses for every message.
Zope is good. It is the right kind of tool from the right kind of company with an excellent business model and a superb built-in scripting language.
With Zope you have the power to do day-to-day managment with a minimum of effort while still having all the freedom to extend, improve, and fundamentally rework every component of the system.
This is the *only* complete application server that is true open-source. Zope is professionally supported and is maturing extremely rapidly.
You won't be disapponted if you commit to Zope for your platform.
LonWorks is interesting, it consists of these single chip network nodes for ~$5. The neuron chip is ~$3-4 and there is an inductor for ~$2 to provide isolation. The media is a single twisted pair. Each device is really simple and you need a central controller to 'administer' the net. But they tend to get a hefty profit off that controller portion.
Lonworks is good for well-defined dedicated tasks. Everyone I know who's tried to do anything that requires flexibility has really gotten in to trouble. LonWorks is best in factory control systems that do the same thing for 20 to 50 years. Industrial Automation is a bad space to play in since factories are so conservative. Once they are committed to using a vendor, they tend to stay with it. Lonworks has serious headaches for the developer.
Using Raw ethernet is not much more expensive than lonworks, especially when you consider that cabling costs tend to dwarf both lonworks and Ethernet components. To make this vision work requires new wireless protocols.
Jini is an interesting concept. There are many people at the Media Lab who have been pushing similar ideas. They have a whole group dedicated to Things That Think, and putting intelligence and networking hidden into everyday devices, so you can get the benefits without even knowing that it is there. This has long-term credibility, but everybody talks about it while few companies actually produce. Sun has some incredible concepts with Jini, simplifying the whole arena of making devices talk to each other. This has *long term credibility* since no-one else is addressing the issue of how to make protocol design easier for our limited human brains. The MIT Media Lab has a special group focusing on Personal Infromation Architectures http://www.media.mit.edu/pia attempting to address these same issues and solve them. The great thing is, real-world software can be developed in a research setting. Real-world hardware requires a company to sell it. In this space the software is what's hard, and that makes PIA's work very exciting.
Ecos is just an operating system for embedded devices. Most people still just write their own OS from scratch when they need an embedded OS. The OS starts out as a superloop and functionality gets added as people need more features. Finally somebody realizes it needs to sit on a network and that gets added too. What you end up with is a *minimal* solution but at huge development expense. Other embedded OSes are hard to cut up because one can't share the cut-ups with others. Everybody has to re-invent OS partitioning.
Ecos means anybody can strip the OS down to the bone and share that, leading to a community of minimal OS implementations tuned for narrow applications. This isn't revolutionary either though since a free embedded OS has been available for some time,known as RTEMS. At one point RTEMS was selected as the core OS for http://www.jos.org , trying to build a free java-based operating system. I'm not sure if they are still using RTEMS or have developed a new custom kernel.
Slashdot Mirror
I just collected some photos from the debate. There were a lot of people milling around afterwards discussing the event. http://morseall.org/~pehr/photos/2000-10-02/
I've been working for the last year
to build a morse-code shell that
has voice and speach synthesized feedback.
http://morseall.org
I don't have many users yet, but I'd
love to hear comments and feedback.
Please try it and let me know how
it works for you. Sound can be
turned off from the config file.
Combined with autologin, it feels like
it is at the point of being reliably
useful for quadrapalegics in need of
a reliable terminal.
Ever taken apart a mouse? The buttons are just simple pushbutton switches. You want a paddle keyer, just solder wires to the switch inside your mouse and there you go! I designed this for the lowest common denominater, a simple pushbutton switch. If you can connect a swich in parallel with your mouse button, you can still use your mouse as normal with two extra wires running out the back. -pehr
For real morse code action on a linux box
check out Morseall.
This is an actively developed morse code
user interface for a linux shell.
http://pehr.net/morseall
-pehr
Dear Linux Users!
I have developed a GPL'd morse code interface
for a linux shell. Please download it
and try it out!
http://pehr.net/morseall
I would love to get more feedback on this
so that I can make it more usefull.
This is intended to be a complete user
interface controlled by a single mouse button.
Send me email if you need help setting
it up. I have someone working on documentation
and want to make this an open-source application
of the highest quality!
-pehr anderson
pehr@morseall.org
This sounds like a job for
http://www.troubleshooters.com
Troubleshooting follows a general
problem solving process, which makes any
intractible problem look like debugging
a program. There is always a place to
start. You never have to feel overwhelmed.
And basically you know that there are a
million other troubleshooters out there who
are on your side all the way.
If you are looking for more specific
references on wiring computers for kids and
schools,
there is a new initiative directed at
getting better software into schools
called.
http://www.openclassroom.com
This is really a worthwhile ambition.
Good luck! (and remember, the computer
is your friend...)
Exchange has the ability (or so I've heard)
to export a web-viewable format for the
proprietary features.
I use exchange with the Netscape client
and someday hope to have access to the
closed calenderingsystem through the web.
It is not worth your salary to suffer
under Outlook, knowing that your mail is
stored locally (and on the server)
in a closed, proprietary format.
In other words, if you are an outlook &
exchange user you have *no* unmitigated
access to your data (other than through
untrusted executables, ie outlook & exchange).
The Blackberry unit is available from
http://www.Wyndtell.com
It is a re-branded RIM (Research In Motion)
pager using the Mobitex (formerly from Ericsson)
from Bellsouth. Service is pretty broad,
and includes most metropolitan areas.
I have one and it works great.
Just call them up and tell them
to set it to use your actual email
address as the reply-to addr for
messages. They'll complain about
how this breaks the self-configuration
features of the device, but you don't
need those features anyway.
Then, set your normal email account to
additionally forward messages to your
Wyndtell email address. You get messages
in both places, and when you reply
your reply address is the same!!!
I hope the Palm VII works as well as the
Wyndtell RIM pager because I hate having
to re-enter email addresses for every
message.
-pehr anderson
Zope is good. It is the right kind of tool
from the right kind of company with an
excellent business model and a superb built-in
scripting language.
With Zope you have the power to do day-to-day
managment with a minimum of effort while
still having all the freedom to extend,
improve, and fundamentally rework every
component of the system.
This is the *only* complete application server
that is true open-source. Zope is professionally
supported and is maturing extremely rapidly.
You won't be disapponted if you commit to
Zope for your platform.
Here is a comparison from my experience:
LonWorks is interesting, it consists of these
single chip network nodes for ~$5.
The neuron chip is ~$3-4 and there is an
inductor for ~$2 to provide isolation.
The media is a single twisted pair.
Each device is really simple and you need
a central controller to 'administer' the
net. But they tend to get a hefty profit
off that controller portion.
Lonworks is good for well-defined dedicated
tasks. Everyone I know who's tried to do
anything that requires flexibility has
really gotten in to trouble. LonWorks
is best in factory control systems that
do the same thing for 20 to 50 years.
Industrial Automation is a bad space to
play in since factories are so conservative.
Once they are committed to using a vendor,
they tend to stay with it. Lonworks has
serious headaches for the developer.
Using Raw ethernet is not much more expensive
than lonworks, especially when you consider
that cabling costs tend to dwarf both lonworks
and Ethernet components. To make this vision
work requires new wireless protocols.
Jini is an interesting concept. There
are many people at the Media Lab who
have been pushing similar ideas.
They have a whole group dedicated to
Things That Think, and putting intelligence
and networking hidden into everyday devices,
so you can get the benefits without even
knowing that it is there.
This has long-term credibility, but everybody
talks about it while few companies actually
produce. Sun has some incredible concepts
with Jini, simplifying the whole arena of
making devices talk to each other.
This has *long term credibility* since no-one
else is addressing the issue of how to make
protocol design easier for our limited
human brains.
The MIT Media Lab has a special group focusing
on Personal Infromation Architectures
http://www.media.mit.edu/pia
attempting to address these same issues
and solve them. The great thing is, real-world
software can be developed in a research setting.
Real-world hardware requires a company to sell it.
In this space the software is what's hard, and
that makes PIA's work very exciting.
Ecos is just an operating system for embedded
devices. Most people still just write their
own OS from scratch when they need an embedded
OS. The OS starts out as a superloop and
functionality gets added as people need more
features. Finally somebody realizes it needs
to sit on a network and that gets added too.
What you end up with is a *minimal* solution
but at huge development expense. Other
embedded OSes are hard to cut up because
one can't share the cut-ups with others.
Everybody has to re-invent OS partitioning.
Ecos means anybody can strip the OS down to the
bone and share that, leading to a community of
minimal OS implementations tuned for narrow
applications. This isn't revolutionary either
though since a free embedded OS has been available
for some time,known as RTEMS.
At one point RTEMS was selected as the core
OS for http://www.jos.org , trying to build a
free java-based operating system. I'm not sure
if they are still using RTEMS or have developed
a new custom kernel.