[HN Gopher] Dip Switch USB Stick
___________________________________________________________________
Dip Switch USB Stick
Author : tambourine_man
Score : 61 points
Date : 2022-02-03 20:58 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (twitter.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (twitter.com)
| gkhartman wrote:
| One of my favorite things in life is the the feeling I get when I
| open something up to find a pcb populated with dip switches (or
| jumpers) that are clearly labeled on the pcb. This practice has
| most likely disappeared to save pcb space, but it feels great
| when you don't have to grep config files or search for a long
| lost manual pdf.
| mark-r wrote:
| This would have backfired on one project I worked on. Near the
| end of the project I was asked to document the working of the
| DIP switches. I discovered that the settings were too complex,
| I couldn't document it in any way that would make sense to a
| user. But then I realized that they were being interpreted in
| software, and it was my software - I could make them do
| anything I wanted! So I wrote the documentation the way I
| thought made sense, then changed the software to match the
| documentation. If the switches had been labeled on the PCB it
| would have been too late for that.
| loudthing wrote:
| This seems super pointless but fun.
| bobsmooth wrote:
| Good excuse to use the pretty rainbow switches.
| sen wrote:
| The best projects are.
| duxup wrote:
| I would have preferred jumpers... but I'll accept this.
| jpm_sd wrote:
| This is so weird, I love it
| zw123456 wrote:
| Back when I was very first learning to use the USB driver for the
| PIC MCU I made something similar except it was even dumber, it
| was just one push button and one LED. I showed it to a few
| buddies and same thing, they started thinking of all kinds of
| funny use cases for it, like a USB controlled light switch or
| whatever.
|
| But seriously, the PIC USB driver, super simple to use and very
| useful for many real useful purposes.
| progre wrote:
| If PIC programmers/debuggers didn't cost about the same as a
| months rent, or at least didn't use proprietary Windows-only
| drivers... I love PIC stuff too but jesus they make it hard to
| choose their stuff for hobby work.
| mark-r wrote:
| Yes, JSON or XML would probably be overkill. How about a simple
| text file with a sequence of 8 '0' or '1' characters?
| Minor49er wrote:
| Nah, it would be best to use a custom piece of hardware that
| occupies a USB slot to store that data instead
|
| Jokes aside, it's a fun and cool project to learn about
| microcontrollers
| mark-r wrote:
| I was thinking of putting the text file on a USB memory
| stick, so you could continue to waste the USB port. You could
| probably pick up an old obsolete one for less than the BOM of
| this project.
| sigmonsays wrote:
| fun stuff... use cases?
|
| here is a couple...
|
| 1. profile location switching. pin 1 on/off = work/away - switch
| system configs appropriately. 2. desktop workspaces, flipping pin
| 2 on enables workspace switching. pin 3 and 4 control workspace
| number.
|
| What else?
| hatware wrote:
| Could be useful with home assistant in a lot of ways, though
| your use cases kind of cover them.
| bobsmooth wrote:
| This could be useful for conferencing on the go. Toggle
| switches for webcam, mic, mute, uhh...different channels?
| adamrmcd wrote:
| A form of 2FA authentication? (Something you have + something
| you know.)
|
| Simply set the value to match a rotating 8-bit token and plug-
| in to login :)
| c0nsumer wrote:
| With this sort of switch you have to worry about the lifecycle
| of the switch. They aren't meant to be toggled routinely. For
| the mentioned DIP switch
| (https://www.farnell.com/datasheets/5461.pdf) it's basically
| assured it'll be fine through 1000 cycles, and likely dead at
| 10,000.
|
| 1000 cycles is only ~3x/day for a year.
| elihu wrote:
| addblock on/off, javascript on/off, vpn on/off, qwerty/dvorak,
| default editor is vim/emacs, indentation is tabs/spaces, the
| dress is blue and black / white and gold, fund police/defund
| police, those are/aren't the droids we're looking for
| tenebrisalietum wrote:
| Integrate with Linux bootloader / boot process.
|
| pin 0 on = normal boot, pin 0 off = single user mode.
|
| pin 1 on = GRUB interactive screen enabled, pin 1 off = GRUB
| interactive screen disabled.
| netsharc wrote:
| helpm33 wrote:
| I had something like that hanging off a parallel port in a PC
| in 1990; it read the status bits of a printer port and booted
| accordingly. Could still do it today, via a $1 USB serial
| port's status bits.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2022-02-03 23:00 UTC)