Recently, an article published in OSNews by Joshua Boyles entitled "The Edge Computing System" captured my attention. This led me to publish my own article entitled "The Next Big Thing? Open Peripheral Hardware Connectivity." I appreciate all the feedback, but I feel that there is still a certain amount of confusion concerning what I was proposing. So, here is a Part II. follow-on article...with some insights that hopefully may flesh things out a bit more.First of all, a quick rehash.
Joshua Boyles in his original article was trying to come up with a world of computer pervasiveness. A world that would allow you to sit down at computers at different physical locations (schools, libraries, hotel rooms) and have your data, programs, and preferences follow you around. Joshua's solution was mainly "software-based". By utilizing a flash memory card containing all your programs, documents, and settings; you could insert this card into standardized computers loaded with a standardized OS. And thus you could carry everything with you and run your applications anywhere.
On the other hand, I presented an idea that was based more on the "hardware side". I tried to come up with a "minimal PDA-sized box" that consisted of CPU, memory, and hard drive. This would be the piece that you take with you. And on the desks at the remote locations are "base stations" (really a firewire bridge) with multiple firewire ports on the front panel. Into these firewire ports are attached what I will term "open firewire peripherals". These are the bulky or loose things you don't want to drag along. Things like keyboards, mice, printers, displays, scanners, etc. In addition, on the back side of the base stations would be ports for phone(modem), Ethernet, cable modem, wireless antenna, etc.
The most important piece of this vision is that the portable piece that you carry with you is totally agnostic as to the choice of CPU and operating system. Your PDA needs only contain the CPU/OS flavor you prefer. Intel running Linux or Windows. Power PC running Apple. Any combination works! Everything from file systems to document types, applications and personal setting--they all work as they always have. And why wouldn't they? It's your PDA hard drive that boots your normal OS and runs your normal programs, isn't it?
However, there is one thing different that OS's in this new world must do: On boot-up, these OS's must present the user with the "option" to load Open Peripheral Environment Support. In the event this option was chosen, the OS would to agree to communicate with the peripherals over a single "physical bus protocol" and also agree to communicate with each peripheral in a predetermined and standardized "logical open peripheral protocol".
Just what is this thing...protocol? And why are there two protocol's...physical...and logical?
A "physical protocol" represents a set of rules that apply at a very low level. They are mostly electrical in nature. Usually these physical protocols tend to be no-brainers. Physical protocols are all buried down within the chips themselves. Just simply plug things together and they work--at the "physical level" that is. Plug in a wall-lamp and the light goes on. In this case "physical" is tied up in concepts like, voltages, amps, alternating current, power plant, power grid, wires, filament--VOILA!
The "bus-part" of our physical protocols are concepts like Ethernet, USB, and Firewire. Each of these different buses is a sort of "unique power grid"...and each follows its own set of voltage, amperage, and all sorts of other electrical rules. But the primary purpose of these "grids" is not to deliver power...but data. To use the properties of electricity to "encode and transmit the information"...in either electrical analog waveforms...or electrical binary digital pulses.
The bottom line is, we have to choose one of these buses to become our standard. I'm going to choose Firewire. (We can argue if that's the best alternative in the posted comments.)
Now, turning to the "logical" side of the equation...specific logical protocols for each device must be specified and adopted. Logical protocols are rules proscribing "the how" of the conversation. For instance, who talks when (the back and forth banter)...and "the content" of the conversation (the data format of the banter). For example, key boards converse in scan codes, mice in mouse packets, printers in printer control languages.
Does this mean we force new standards on everyone? No! Not at all! We could adopt something like the following:
- keyboards would follow Microsoft/PC "scan code" conventions including the new multimedia keys.
- mice would follow Microsoft Mouse Packet format.
- printers would follow HP PCL 6.0.
And even if you don't buy-off on the PDA/Base Station concept--that works too! But at least preserve the basic thesis--and modify OS's to provide the "option" to run Open Peripherals. If the OS becomes "open peripheral compliant", then any open peripherals will be capable of running on any: desktop, laptop, tablets, game consoles, embedded systems, banking terminals, point of sale systems, cash machines, kiosks, etc...
- "Open Peripheral Hardware Connectivity, Part II - Page 1"
- "Open Peripheral Hardware Connectivity, Part II - Page 2"
- "Open Peripheral Hardware Connectivity, Part II - Page 3"
- "Open Peripheral Hardware Connectivity, Part II - Page 4"
