[laptop-accessibility] Introducing me

[Jim Gettys]

Actually, there are two interesting items about the audio ports.
  1) the not uncommon microphone bias voltage, which you can control to
     activate a relay.  (Some microphones need some voltage to operate;
     others do not).
  2) and as cjb notes, the input port can be configured to be a poor 
     man's A/D converter by disabling the high pass filtering on the
     codec, (poor man's in that we don't know how good the resolution is
     on the codec in this mode).  But for most things, it will probably
     do just fine (AD is mostly comparing against audio applications).

You don't get both at once, though.
                                - Jim


On Wed, 2007-05-09 at 20:20 -0700, Peter Korn wrote:
> Hi Michael,
> 
> Welcome to the list.  We are thus-far very low traffic; waiting for a 
> critical mass or critical energy level I think.
> 
> Re: affordable switch devices to connect to the OLCP; one suggestion I 
> got at CSUN was to see if you could use the microphone input port for a 
> potentially very inexpensive switch.  It would mean you couldn't also 
> have an external microphone in use (and perhaps it would also disable 
> the built-in microphone by the act of plugging one in).  Nonetheless, it 
> might allow a <$1 switch...
> 
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Peter Korn
> Accessibility Architect,
> Sun Microsystems, Inc.
> > Hey people,
> > I've been messing with my OLPC unit for a while and trolling the lists a 
> > little. I intend to work on hardware and software for the OLPC that will 
> > allow physically disabled people to more easily use it. I have a 
> > background in software development, electrical engineering, usability, 
> > and Linux and have extensive experience with the handicapped as my 
> > sister has cerebral palsy which makes it difficult for her to do 
> > anything requiring fine motor control. Using a USB adapter I am making 
> > it so she can plug in various kind of switches (jelly switches, sip + 
> > puff switches, etc) that will send mouse events that can easily be 
> > captured and used to control software. I plan to make edutainment, media 
> > playing, and communications programs that will require no more than 
> > three buttons to use. Eventually, I'd like to design my own USB adapter 
> > that could be produced and sold with the OLPC for much less than those 
> > commercially available now (which usually sell for around US$50).
> >
> > I'm also interested in edutainment software in general so I may write 
> > some small educational games and tools. So far I've been experimenting 
> > with if I want to write Gecko based apps or SDL based apps since those 
> > are the two supported systems I'm most familiar with.
> > _______________________________________________
> > accessibility mailing list
> > accessibility at laptop.org
> > http://mailman.laptop.org/mailman/listinfo/accessibility
> >   
> 
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-- 
Jim Gettys
One Laptop Per Child