BUG - "The LEGO of Gadgets" 131
TheBrutalTruth writes "Bug Labs will soon be launching what Webware calls 'the LEGO of gadgets.' From their site: 'BUG is a collection of easy-to-use electronic modules that snap together to build any gadget you can imagine. Each BUGmodule represents a specific gadget function (ex: a camera, a keyboard, a video output, etc). You decide which functions to include and BUG takes care of the rest, letting you try out different combinations quickly and easily. With BUG and the integrated programming environment/web community (BUGnet), anyone can build, program, and share innovative devices and applications. We don't define the final products — you do.'" Looks a bit vaporous, but conceptually interesting.
Looking forward to the teleporter (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Looking forward to the teleporter (Score:4, Insightful)
The concept is a great one, though. And also one that goes back a long way to all the electronics kits I used to have as a kid. What I'm wondering is mainly: How easy would it be to build custom modules that 'click into' all the other modules? And with that I mean not using the already available ones.
That's basically what I ended up doing with those electronics kits. Little wooden blocks with my own R/C circuit on it, and connecting that into the existing block of the kit. I'm a bit doubtful about this being feasable in this sort of setup, though, since the complexity is probably way too high. A shame, really..
Give kids more electronics kits! (Let them build their own computer with a Z80
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http://www.quasarelectronics.com/sc01.htm [quasarelectronics.com]
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You could easily make a 2 or 4 wire serial bus out of the 4 feet and reception points of a block, but it might be quite limited in speed. Technically though, this could be pretty simple. Most controller and DSP microcontrollers have support for some type of serial bus, and the whole system can standardize on one.
Something like Microchip's CAN [cam.ac.uk] (controller area network) seems ideal - nodes
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Just what can it do ? (Score:5, Informative)
How is this different from the many embedded boards you can buy or even a PDA/phone (e.g. openmoko) ? The only new feature is fancy packaging. It does not appear you can connect more these four modules or link bases together easily.
I wish they actually made something that let you do new things. For example, I would be delighted to shell out $299 for one of these:
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Re:Just what can it do ? (Score:4, Interesting)
I have a few tips from personal experience. You can get multilayer boards built fairly inexpensively if you can justify having four made at one time: you might be looking at under $80/board for a 6-layer (although I'm not positive about that. I know you can get 4 layer done for under $60/board.)
It's possible, although unpleasant, to reflow your own BGA's. You need a microscope with a tilt-head. Draw the BGA package outline in the layout software as a silkscreen, making sure it's at least as large as the actual package, or even better, draw several outlines of increasing size. Align the BGA visually within the closest package size, double-check by looking at the edge with bright illumination and a microscope to make sure you're basically on-pad, then gently reflow it down with a heat gun. It works best if you can preheat the board from the bottom with one heat gun on low, then do the reflow from the top with the second one.
I'm doing this at work with microSMD, which are way, way smaller than BGA -- chips 3mm on a side with 12 bumps on the bottom. After a bit of work I have a 70% success rate. The main thing I've found is that while you're reflowing, you'll see the chip move as the capillary action of the solder pulls it into place. Very, very lightly touch the chip on one edge with a probe. If it rocks, the center isn't yet reflowed and it's pivoting on the as-of-yet-solid bumps. When the whole chip bounces like a spring on all the melted bumps, rather than rocking, then it should be good.
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I also have only made 4 layer boards, $250 for 5 copies. The problem, as you mention, is yield. BGA chips can't be easily reworked, so if any got screwed up the entire board is toast. With FPGA and PHYs being more than $30 each this quickly adds to cost and difficulty - and reduces the number of people who would want to replicate the project.
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The main problems we see are: ground plane connectivity with the bga bump, because the ground plane pad isn't warm enough
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ideal price point: 35 cents (Score:2)
more interesting.. (Score:2)
Re:more interesting.. (Score:5, Interesting)
http://www.gumstix.com/ [gumstix.com]
Re:more interesting.. (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.compulab.co.il/all-products/html/products.htm [compulab.co.il]
Layne
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The 'cool' part of this tech is using devices together in a way not previously considered... But the devices wouldn't know how to do that. There's have to be special software written. I wonder if it's got an open source OS
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Re:more interesting..Here's What You Want! (Score:5, Informative)
Excellent for the Hobbist (Score:2)
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Hobbits I'm afraid may either have little use for this, or try to rule the world by means of WMD (Weapons of Mass Dysfunction...)
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Come to think of it, the Hobbits mightn't either...
Overhyped? (Score:5, Insightful)
It really doesn't seem all that different than your average embedded dev-kit + a USB hub. Certainly the comparison to LEGO does not hold. LEGOs are based on a key component of classical construction: The brick. Toys of its nature existed long before the LEGO was invented. The key innovation to the LEGO was the "snap-together" interface which gave the bricks a structural stability that their real-world counterpart lacked.
What you have here is not so much a key innovation on top of existing, generic components, but rather a repackaging of components that can be found in a variety of products. Of course, there's always the possibility that I'm underestimating this design. In which case I look forward to BUG proving me wrong.
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except that it has a chassis, battery and WiFi.
You can either go the gumstix route and roll your own, which seems painful and actually ends up being quite expensive, or you can try to hack existing portable music players, which, (at least until recently [slashdot.org]), wasn't really panning out.
Although the platform isn't very interesting at this point because of the lack of peripherals, the price is actually pretty good.
I'm interes
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for $300 you can buy two OLPC computers which include the keyboard and display, a cool meshing wi-fi bridge etc
AIK
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Agreed (Score:2)
At first I was totally psyched, then upon further examination I decided that, really, I can accomplish much cooler and more interesting things, for now, with a Gumstix linux computer (or a cluster thereof) or a Parallax "stamp" or even something like this guy here [makezine.com]. The problem is that none of my ideas require only an LCD screen, motion sensor, camera or speaker. They all require the ability to tie in other circuits in a way that this device doesn't appear to support (there's ethernet, for instance--also ove
I really like this idea. (Score:1)
Think of it, with millions of people out there building essentially whatever they want/need, the way things are going across the world someone is bound to infringe on someone else's IP or such.
Good idea, hope it changes the world for the better...
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Beam me up! (Score:1)
Teleporter (Score:1)
-Peter
Didn't we already do this... (Score:5, Insightful)
Seems like nothing more than the recreation of a PC with non-standard interconnects.
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Only four connection points? (Score:1)
Oh Crap... (Score:4, Funny)
Maybe I'm not creative enough... (Score:1, Insightful)
Neat idea, but definitely overhyped.
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And I bet that is not even the best idea, and more components are to follow...
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2. Motion sensor detects guard outside door.
3. Hit guard over head with LCD screen.
The camera's just for posterity.
C'mon man! What would MacGyver do?
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Only 4 ports? (Score:3, Insightful)
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Whatever happened to LEGO of electronics? (Score:5, Interesting)
I remember about 30 years ago, there was this set with these little clear plastic cubes. Each cube contained a discrete component: a resistor, transistor, wire, whatever. You could fit the cubes together to make a circuit. I don't remember what that was, or whatever happened to it.
Maybe it was German. I remember my dad used to bring me home a lot of Philips electronics kits from his business trips to Europe.
--Rob
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I bought one of these for my Nephew this last Christmas... not sure if he's lost all of the parts yet or not...
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Blo(c)ktroni(x|cs) (Score:4, Interesting)
Both, at least, allowed anybody to build simple to reasonably-complex electronic devices without the need for either A. soldering or B. pushing the components into little metal strips of a 'base board', leading to all kinds of problems, especially at younger ages.
The major down side that I ran into was that whatever you built - it ended up rather big. The blocks where maybe 2cm on each side for the simple components (a speaker would be 3x3x1 block in size, etc.).
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The ones I'm talking about were different in that:
- they were a more vibrant green
- they were completely cubic (the small pieces, at least); no cylindrical protrusion on top
- they didn't use metal strips, but rather metal contacts and studs. The studs were round (conical) and would slot into the contact like a 'dovetail joint'; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Joinery-throughdovetail.gif [wikipedia.org]
The above two points make it so that you could actually twist the blocks and form junc
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http://images.lifeaftercoffee.com/v/bloc-tronic/ [lifeaftercoffee.com]
Which has excellent images of the individual blocks, the manual (with a robot-shaped design) on the front, etc.
Maybe there's patents in the way - or they're still being made - or they're too expensive to make - but the Denshi Block people could pick up a thing or two from them.
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Unfortunately, not many people remember it [transistor.org]
God, I feel old, now...
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Mindstorm (Score:2)
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LED please? (Score:1)
Robot? (Score:2)
Hopefully (Score:1)
Vaporous? (Score:2)
Maybe we really have got to the stage where a cool-sounding concept and a pretty website is an indicator of an imaginary product... But a little research before publically labelling a young company a vapor vendor might be nice.
LEGO of software (Score:1)
days 15 years later, I have returned to my roots, and is working on
a graphics program that uses this idea, but limited in 2 dimensions.
Its kind of a
http://toolboxapp.com/ [toolboxapp.com]
The people that has made
They have made some incredible things, such as
This is a great tribute to lego bricks. From a programming view point
its some really challenging t
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a generic I/O board would be so much cooler (Score:2)
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Brainless (Score:1)
Geeks these days... (Score:2)
The closest thing I can find on Google now is the modern version [radioshack.com], which looks pretty darn close.
Computer like this in the 80's (Score:2)
So if you wanted a hard drive simply snap it on the end of what was called the "brick". latch on a floppy or an async port or video module etc.
The more devices attached then the longer the brick became.
It ran DOS and the other details about it are too hazy to
The future is small, embedded, and disposable. (Score:1)
We got IC's instead (Score:1)
We got ICs because Jack Kilby invented the Integrated Circuit in response to a requirement to create modular electronics.
See here [ti.com] or here [internetnews.com]
Dupe? (Score:3, Informative)
Its not the hardware, its the architecture (Score:1)
As the article explains, its the concept of "hardware based mash-ups" thats really interesting. The initial modules themselves are pretty much standard across most high-even portable devices (e.g. my iPhone). However, instead of a more typical hobbyist approach of developing some hardware and letting low-level programmers fuss
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Sounds like a pretty good description of the majority of the hobbyist market for Microchip PICs, Atmel, Lego Mindstorms, and even the OpenCores code repository. Anything you want to do you can get code to do for you, and you
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Take Lego Mindstorms, as far as I remember, the NXT stuff (ARM7TDM based I think) primarily uses LabView. If I wanted to write a custom application to execute on the firmware itself thats a much higher barrier to entry. Furthermore, if I wanted the discrete components to talk to one another and recognize when a component has been added or deleted (hot-plug), I need to write that too. I'm out of the loop on what the hobbyist's are doing with NXT - I mean I remember
Where is the Cell Phone attachment ? (Score:1)
I don't even see that coming in Q2
Like the Chinese motorcycle - almost (Score:1)
Arduino (Score:1)
This would make sense for a KVM (Score:2)
There would be a backplane, then you'd chose a keyboard input block (USB, PS2 or DIN), a mouse input block (USB, PS2, DIN), and, perhaps a microphone (RCA, Phone, Mini, sub-mini) or Game input block (Joystick etc) to plug into one side of the backplane. Then
Re:Not to be captain buzzkill, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
If you have to ask, then you're not the target audience =^)
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Re:Not to be captain buzzkill, but... (Score:4, Insightful)
The same reason LEGO is better than a toy that's already made.
(If we have to explain it, you wouldn't get it.)
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You can buy two camera units and make a stereoscopic camera. If you include the accelerometer, you'd get enough information to create 3D object files by swiping the camera across a scene.
I hope they make a module containing its own CPU that you could stack up on the base to arbitrary heights and build a massively parallel computer. This is like my plan to build a RAID controller out of
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Not a chance in hell of that. The accuracy of this type of GPS is on the order of 10m (at best). Even with high end equipment this technique is not used on smaller planes, because you can't get the antenna far enough apart (the wings are too short).
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> information to create 3D object files by swiping the camera across a scene.
you make that sound so easy!
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