Good things in small packages..
Or at least really neat things occasionally. Especially in the electronics world.
The first find is from eInk, who’s been developing a “Digital Paper” system for a long time now. Well, they’ve finally rolled out a developer’s kit they’re calling the Active Matrix Electronic Paper Prototype Developer Kit. For those of you who don’t know, it’s a method of storing tiny balls of white and black ink that are oppositely charged, between two magnetic plates. They can then adjust the charges to make either the white or black particles draw to the top of the page and be visible. The benefits of such a technology: Visibility in any light, like true paper. It’s also extremely slimline and low on power consumption. You can get more information on it at eInk’s Technology Page. Basically, if you remember the newspapers from Minority Report, this is one step closer to making those a reality. Hook one of these up with a nice touchscreen and you’ld have a great electronic data entry system.
The other neat find today is a company called Gumstix and their waysmall computer. It appears to be no bigger than a cell phone (83mm x 36mm x 15mm), and runs Linux. Runs on a 200Mhz-400Mhz Intel mobile chip and comes with 64M of ram and a build in MMC reader. Prices range from $120 to $210 depending on other options like serial ports or bluetooth. Seems like there would be lots of neat things you could do with a gimmick like this, especially teamed up with the Digital Paper stuff (that’s how I found this). I don’t know what I would personally do with something like this, but it’s neat to keep in the back of your mind. As cheap as they are, tho, I’m tempted to buy one or two just to play with. Try hooking up a webcam to one with a wifi addition as a security camera, or try using one for a super-small MP3 gizmo.
Maybe try to put one in the car… there’s an idea…
