Re: [9fans] Wearables

[john@csplan9.rit.edu]

> On 5/17/07, john@csplan9.rit.edu <john@csplan9.rit.edu> wrote:
>> > lucio@proxima.alt.za wrote:
>> > But if ever there was a market born to take best advantage of Plan9's long suit,
>> > handheld, or 'wearable' has to be the most obvious contender, and on power nd
>> > bandwidth consumption as much as CPU cycles or 'local' RAM capacity.
>> >
>>
>> A friend and I are starting a project to create a simple wearable computer. We've
>> got some hardware to get started; probably will begin with a laptop, our camera
>> viewfinder HMD, and a keyboard strapped around the waist (crude, I know) or
>> some form of home-brewed chording device. I considered using Plan 9, but since
>> we don't plan to include a pointing device yet, and the viewfinder can only display
>> low resolutions and in black and white, I think we'll end up going with something
>> designed to be used 80x24 characters at a time... Linux. If somebody can present
>> me with some good reasons to use Plan 9 instead, we can try it, but I really
>> don't think Plan 9 actually is ideal for a wearable.
> 
> 80x24 eh? So, the provision, or lack thereof, of a "glass tty" is the
> deciding factor?
> 
> I think your decision tree needs to have a few branches grafted on :-)
> 
> ron
> p.s. Due to new workplace health and safety regulations, I am not
> allowed to tell you how to pronounce "glass tty"

Well, Ron, as explained elsewhere, our display gets hard to read pretty easily.
Even 80x24 may be too small for continued use; it's something that will need to
be tested. If you or anybody else wants to send us a better head-mounted
display, do it. For now, I'm going to concentrate on using the (free) display
we have... people were apparently productive for 40+ years using only TTYs,
glass or paper as it may be.

John