[HN Gopher] Pockit Modular computing demo [video]
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Pockit Modular computing demo [video]
Author : Aissen
Score : 173 points
Date : 2021-03-26 11:12 UTC (11 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.reddit.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.reddit.com)
| Solder_Man wrote:
| Hey HN,
|
| Thanks @Aissen. Didn't know whether the project's unfinished
| state was worthy of it, but happy to see this appear on my
| favorite minimalistic website : - )
|
| Here is the full video:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1Ui-y8ajJ0&list=UU49EYw900L...,
| which also provides a bit of the background. And the project
| website has more of the story + demos.
|
| I'll answer the existing comments, and welcome any new questions,
| whether deeply technical or completely casual. (After all, the
| project's goal lies at the intersection of these two!)
| tartoran wrote:
| This is very cool. I am amazed that this is a one man project
| hrdwdmrbl wrote:
| I'm sorry that I have nothing more to say than that this is
| incredible! And I love the minimal white aesthetics! So slick!
| It's not The Mother of All Demos but it's up there.
| hanief wrote:
| This is impressive. The nerd in me wants to play with it right
| away, but the skeptic me just doesn't see that this will be mass
| produced anytime soon. Hopefully I'm wrong.
| Solder_Man wrote:
| "Play" sounds about right. I've enjoyed the exponential
| multiplier in prototyping+design speed I've gained as each new
| block was made.
|
| "Mass produced" -- no mass-production plans yet, however...
| will be ordering and assembling at least a small-batch of
| boards for early-testers/adopters. Stay tuned through the
| website if you want to get on the list, depending on your use-
| case and experimental willingness.
| asicsp wrote:
| See also discussion from 3 days back, linking to pockit.ai:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26547377
| jpm_sd wrote:
| This is art. I mean that as a compliment.
|
| It's beautifully executed and, as a finished consumer product,
| completely useless. Hell of a thing to have in your portfolio
| when you're looking for jobs, though!
| infinite8s wrote:
| Why is it useless?
| JohnKacz wrote:
| https://pockit.ai/ - main website
| anotheryou wrote:
| I know you don't mass produce (yet :)) ?), but do you know how
| much this would have to cost?
| Solder_Man wrote:
| My engineer-mind hesitates to state a number until I finalize
| the BOM and get tooling quotes, etc. At that point, I'll put up
| the pricing, etc. on the website and mailing list.
|
| But keeping Pockit's cost down is important in order for the
| concept to gain a wide community of passionate builders, so
| just know that I've been and am keeping affordability in mind,
| starting with even the design choices.
| j-pb wrote:
| Pretty crazy for what seems to be a one person project.
|
| How do you even get your hands on/produce such a weirdly sized
| trackpad?!
| Solder_Man wrote:
| Used to be just me. But two amazing people assisting me now
| (one of them full-time); immediately took this decision upon
| recognizing the significant community interest from Reddit, et
| al.
|
| The trackpad is one of my favorite recent Blocks. It's a great
| instance of circuit scalability. I use standard projected-
| capacitive-touch with a sensing IC that reads a rectangular
| grid of electrodes -- but they are all printed on the PCB, thus
| adding no significant cost whether small or big, sparse or
| dense.
|
| The difficult part was two things:
|
| - optimizing SNR (signal-to-noise ratio) at the sensing stage
| of the code
|
| - and converting the input data to actual action-coordinates
| (relative) that are submitted as emulated-input to the OS.
|
| Software filtering helped with the former. For the latter, I
| started with and customized an algorithm documented in an a
| manufacturer's application-note document (I think it was
| Microchip or Azoteq).
| j-pb wrote:
| Absolutely amazing!
|
| I hope you keep at it and we'll be able to get our hands on
| one some day. It's so ridiculously cool!
|
| Currently I'm waiting on a ClockworkPi devterm as my new
| laptop replacement.
|
| I'd love to replace my phone with a pockit, with a small
| physical keyboard module, and replace my laptop with a
| megapockit with a huge backplane and a big modular keyboard.
|
| The possbilities! Thanks again for making something so cool
| and inspirational!
| Solder_Man wrote:
| > megapockit with a huge backplane and a big modular
| keyboard
|
| Look at that... the human mind is phenomenal.
|
| We're not all ultra-skilled, detail-oriented electrical
| engineers. So why does _every_ person have to go through (a
| tiring rite of passage of) wiring, soldering, debugging,
| coding from scratch -- instead of using the same creative
| mind and effort to come up with ideas, and actually play
| with their implementation?
|
| I'm not primarily a developer, but it's easy to see how
| much the _software_ world mushroomed through DRY,
| modularity, etc. In some ways, Pockit is an effort to do
| the same for electronics prototyping.
| tra3 wrote:
| ...speechless. Like one of the posters said this is art. The
| technical acumen is amazing, but the production value for this
| video is incredible! So well done.
| tomcam wrote:
| Licensing terms?
| twobitshifter wrote:
| Very cool. I think we're so used to a shortage of ports nowadays
| that "plug and play" seems like magic. Thank you for bringing it
| back better than ever in a compact user friendly form. I could
| plug a keyboard, mouse, display, camera, and gps antenna into my
| laptop with a big enough USB hub, but it won't be as beautiful as
| this solution.
| bogwog wrote:
| This is awesome! Seems a little useless/gimmicky at first glance,
| but the more I think about it the more it makes sense for home
| automation. It certainly beats buying (or building) tons of
| specialized devices for individual tasks, and would enable you to
| solve nearly any task imaginable with relatively little effort.
|
| The limited space for blocks seems like a potential drawback
| though. Is there a hard limit on the number of modules that you
| can fit on a single PI? I can't imagine you could just slap on 5
| HDMI output blocks on a single board.
| Solder_Man wrote:
| Glad you changed your mind.
|
| About "limits":
|
| As u/moistbar also pointed out, the number of pins of the
| Broadcom CPU, and of the STM32 microcontroller, would provide a
| constraint. If more positions was important, I could easily
| have put a bunch of IO-expanders or multiplexers.
|
| However, the board was designed with compactness as a priority
| -- "pocket"-sized and all that -- so as to be portable and
| flexibly deployable.
|
| The solution for "space" is quite fun: You can chain multiple
| Pockit boards side by side, through the same style of Bridge-
| connector that allows expansion to the Display Block in the
| linked video here.
|
| With this, a huge (but not unlimited) workspace is possible.
| Frankly, aside from the most spatially demanding application
| I've tested (a synth/looper setup), I've never needed more than
| 3 chained together.
|
| > 5 HDMI output blocks I didn't see the need for something like
| this. There are obviously compromises in every design, and I
| suppose this is one of them, if you think it's actually
| valuable. Though an HDMI splitter block would technically solve
| this issue too.
| moistbar wrote:
| I would assume the number of blocks is limited by the number of
| available GPIO pins on the Pi, but I can't say for certain.
| mholm wrote:
| Big fan of this! Have you explored using this platform as a sort
| of USB C port hub for a full desktop environment? Being able to
| effectively create your own docking station would solve a ton of
| problems in the current market.
| goda90 wrote:
| It looks like it has a SO-DIMM-like slot that can fit the
| Raspberry Pi Compute Module 3. Unfortunately the CM4 went with a
| different style connector, so in a sense, it's already obsolete.
| It'd be great if someday there were a standard for these kinds of
| connectors that all the SBC manufacturers were using.
| Solder_Man wrote:
| As I mentioned in a deeply embedded comment somewhere on
| Reddit, wait for the upgraded-PCB version demo coming up in the
| next week, you're going to love it if you're a fan of the CM4's
| more powerful Broadcom CPU.
|
| Note: Obviously, this too won't solve the issue of hardware
| universal-standards; nothing ever will. People just have the
| tendency to never get along. We are all great at being _OK-
| enough_ with each other though.
| marcodiego wrote:
| I think 96boards is exactly that, no?
| varjag wrote:
| Slick.
|
| I have a lingering suspicion though that the cross connector
| pads, despite looking identical, serve their own specialized
| functions and cannot be freely mixed. I.e. it would be highly
| challenging to have all the pads accept USB or HDMI.
| Solder_Man wrote:
| Only high-bandwidth signal groups (such as HDMI) have the
| limitation of being usable at only one (or a few) positions.
| Technically these too can be given more/complete placement
| freedom, but at the cost of a higher PCB layer count, or
| exceptional noise-immune routing skill, which I presently don't
| have. I plan to hire a layout expert to assist with the DFM
| eventually.
|
| The current PCB routing is done such that about 90% of blocks
| can be interfaced at almost/all positions. (I'll make a more
| formal statement later after verifying this number.)
|
| This was in fact a foundational aspect of the design -- "How
| can the classic breadboard be made (a lot) more powerful at the
| cost of as little flexibility as possible?"
| varjag wrote:
| You can't easily splice balanced signal lines, so it's going
| to end up more complicated than just a routing issue.
|
| But I like the concept. I understand that the pads are
| indexed with magnet locks? What happens if a user crams a
| component in incorrect orientation anyway?
| Solder_Man wrote:
| > signal lines
|
| Good point. I stand corrected.
|
| > orientation
|
| Two features ensure (and encourage) the block placement at
| the correct orientation.
|
| - layout of the 4 magnets' polarities at each position (and
| complementary layout on each Block).
|
| - plastic protrusions within the casing (with mating
| features on each Block).
|
| Just an interesting note: The latter also serve to provide
| a bi-axial constraint on a Block after attachment, to
| prevent easy detachment. Together with the (neodymium)
| magnets, they create a very strong hold, important for
| Blocks like the Soil moisture sensor demo'ed in this video:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vwnpbNNyzdQ&list=UU49EYw900
| L...
| varjag wrote:
| Smart. It's a sweet project, good luck with development!
| peregrine wrote:
| He mentioned in the comments that those two have specific
| positions for routing purposes.
| marcodiego wrote:
| Looks like ara project as it could/should have been.
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(page generated 2021-03-26 23:01 UTC)