nls-technical
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Re: [nls-technical] chord keyset

To: John Sechrest <sechrest@jas.peak.org>
Cc: nls-technical@chm.cim3.net, go@ao.com
From: Philip Gust <gust@NouveauSystems.com>
Date: Sun, 12 Feb 2006 16:08:40 -0800
Message-id: <7.0.0.16.2.20060212151416.06356be8@NouveauSystems.com>
At 03:11 PM 2/12/2006, John Sechrest wrote:    (01)


>Philip Gust <gust@NouveauSystems.com> writes:
>
>  % >  One of the places we got stuck was the need for a driver to
>  % >  coordinate the 5 bits from one keyboard with the 3 bits of the mouse.
>  % >  That was something that we did not process very well.
>
>  % I'm a little confused by it myself.  We wrote some specialized Java
>  % code that processed input from the keyset, and allowed Java to
>  % perform its normal mouse handling.  I imagine that the same would be
>  % done for any other programming language.  It's not clear what the
>  % advantage would be of combining keyboard and mouse handling into a
>  % single driver, especially in a windowed environment.
>
>  Appearently NLS used the three mouse keys as modifiers,
>  so you could get 8 states from the right hand to modify
>  key stroke on the left hand...
>
>  so if you have
>
>  10110 000
>  10110 100
>  10110 010
>  10110 001
>
>  The the five keys on the left are generating different keys based
>  on the keys on the right side.    (02)

I can see how there may be advantages to combining mouse and keyboard 
input into a single driver.  That way it can be used with any 
application.  The challenge I can foresee is trying to do that under 
multiple OSes and their window system environments, and making it 
user or application configurable.  It would also be nice for such a 
driver provide a way to emulate a keyset/mouse combo using a standard 
keyboard/mouse with an appropriate modifier (similar to an embedded 
numeric keypad using the numlock key)    (03)

Up to now we've been treating the "vintage" keyset as an auxiliary 
input device, and allowing the AugTerm application to read the device 
through a set of APIs and interpret keypad/mouse input.  For example, 
on Linux, the vintage keypad appear as a USB joystick and we read it 
through /dev/input/js0.  The advantage is that we can leverage 
existing drivers on various OSes.    (04)

There's also a separate question of what type of USB device the 
keyset should identify itself as, and if that should be one of the 
standard types then which one.    (05)




>  % >  It is possible that Gary might be persuadable to do it off the clock.
>  % >  However, I do not see that happening on the time schedule you
>  % >  are laying out. I will ask gary tomorrow if the things that he
>  % >  is interested in stepping up to this project by end of May or
>  % >  not.
>
>  % Thanks for taking this to them.  There are certain promotional
>  % opportunities that AO might be able to take advantage of were it to
>  % do this on a pro-bono basis.  However, I understand about the funding
>  % issue as well.
>
>  Yes, there are some wins.
>
>
>  % In that case, could you find out what it would cost
>  % to get something ready to bid out for manufacturing in May or June by
>  % completing the hardware and electrical design, and building a
>  % prototype?
>
>  Yes, I can get Gary to put together a quote for putting together
>  12 units. Is that the number that you want?    (06)

I'd suggest breaking the quote down into two parts.  One is the NRE 
required to get it ready for manufacturing.  The other is the cost of 
manufacturing certain numbers of units.  It's hard to say how many we 
may need over time.  As more people use the restored NLS/Augment 
system or the next generation system being planned, they may want to 
have a keyset.  Some people may also want one purely as a 
collectable.  In that case, we would like to be able to sell them 
one.  I recommend quoting an initial 12, and then incremental units 
of 48 keysets (or whatever volume makes sense).    (07)



>  % We can probably get someone to do the drivers on a
>  % volunteer basis if you can take care of the hardware end.  I'd expect
>  % that if we found funding, this would be work for hire that would be
>  % whoever funded it.
>
>
>  You will have to help me constrain the project some.
>  Do you want us to replicate directly what is there?
>  or do you want us to make some optimization for price?
>  Or do you want us to make any evolutionary steps for it?    (08)

Optimizing for price would be fine.  It would be great if we could 
retain the look and feel of the original, for those who may want one 
as an historical artifact.  No need, though, to go through the effort 
of a 15-pin analog output that must be converted to a game port and 
again to a USB interface, for example. As to what  type of USB device 
it would appear as, we'll need to get a bit of a technical discussion 
going on that.    (09)





>  % I'll hope to hear from you again in the next few days.
>
>  I will talk to gary on monday and try to have you some
>  details with in a day or so.    (010)

Thanks!    (011)


>-----
>John Sechrest          .         Helping people use
>                         .           computers and the Internet
>                           .            more effectively
>                              .
>                                  .       Internet: sechrest@peak.org
>                                       .
>                                               . http://www.peak.org/~sechrest    (012)


Philip Gust
Nouveau Systems, Inc.    (013)

phone: +1 650 961-7992
fax:   +1 520 843-7217    (014)


mailto: gust@NouveauSystems.com     (015)



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