[9fans] building blocks speaking 9p

[Bakul Shah <bakul@iitbombay.org>]

The idea:
- make it very easy to create hardware gadgets by
  providing a firmware/hardware building block that
  talks 9p on the host interface side & interfaces
  with device specific hardware.

- use a "universal" 9p driver on the host side that
  allows access to any such 9p device even from a shell.

- provide a standard way to find out device capabilities.

- together they provide a plug-and-play setup.

Example: connect an LED and a current sensor to this
9p device, other necessary hardware, add a few config
bits and plug this device kn]]into a host. Now you should
be able to turn on/off the light or sense its state.

Similarly you should be able to control a stepper motor
servo, cameras, microphones, other actuators, sensors,
IO etc. Eventually you should be able to snap together
enough of these components to build larger assemblies
such as a 3D printer.

Another example: a "hub" to multiplex such downstream
devices and make them available to a host.

This will probably have to ride on USB first. A verilog
implementation would be useful in an FPGA!

Would this be a useful component? If such a thing were
available, what would you want to build with it?

Do you think 9p is the right protocol for this?

Ideally
- connect anything to anything
- authenticated connections
- drive the device through a shell script
- no new low level drivers
- self-identifying devices with help and command syntax
- signicantly eases the task of creating new h/w devices.

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