*NEW* USB Input/Output Board -- Fusion Brain

[2k1Toaster]

Quote: Originally Posted by greenman100

Yes, there will be a lot more documentation when the product is fully released.

I do want to clarify something though - although we have designed the Fusion to be foolproof, we are not responsible for you guys hooping things up backwards. It will be as simple to connect as a blowdryer, but we're not responsible if you do something like drop it in a bathtub.

Ah! You missed the perfect and I think only legit use of this smiley:







maybe electrocution in the tub, so

[turbocad6]

alright, my initial plans for this unit is going to be real simple, I'm going to be able to wake my vehicle by calling it from my cell phone, then I will be able to remote into it from anywhere, this is all independent of this board, where this board comes in is as the vehicle interface.

I will remote in to the carpc & access this exe & then be able to press a button on my remote PC connected thru the net & start the car, press another & turn on the interior lights, another to turn XY or Z on, etc... then also have a display of temperature light level, fuel level, whatever...

some of this will be very easy for me to implement, I've been planning something like this already & the way I'm going to do the engine start, door opening & windows & stuff will be directly connecting to a spare RF alarm remote with micro relays, for example to vent the widows is channel 2 for 2 seconds, while a momentary press of the same button, say 500ms, & that opens the side sliding door

I'm guessing this part is straight forward & easy enough, if the addition of servos came down the road that would be a HUGE plus & put this several more notches up there






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where I'm going to get a bit complicated is in the skinning of this, I mean having this run as an exe & embedding it in RR or cf is great & I'm guessing very doable, but having just square buttons on a background image while being functional, would be just boring, what I've got in mind is I'd like to build a nice graphic image of the vehicle on the screen & have hot spots to activate/deactivate things : press the drivers window & it opens, press the steering wheel & it starts, but there also must be a status feedback of some sort, like a way to know & display whether a window is actually open or closed, this data can come from an input I'm guessing, but I'd then like to be able to display this on my graphic

I looked at the skin file & it looks real basic, select the fonts & the images to call, everything else just is as it is...

is there a way to change the position of these buttons? if you could position the buttons where you'd want them, & then have an off, a down & an on state, each calling a part of a different image, this interface would be friggin awesome, could just hide the text even at that point if necissary...

maybe it's hard for me to really have you see what I'm thinking of, but basically picture something like the new Benz display,it displays the vehicle & the status of everything, multiple board support would be awesome here too...

maybe this is something that could be already done with RR? could a skin be built to just send commands to this exe?

[2k1Toaster]

Well I am planning to make each buttons location changeable in the skin file too. Just havent done it yet.

And if RR can call a dll, and use it, then you could get the raw byte stream data. I dont know if that is what you meant by using RR. It will mean a lot of coding on your part to get that to work. I am sure you would be up to it, but I know I have a lot of code, but it is mostly configuration and extras.

And this exe can run in the system tray hidden and external programs can send commands to it. Stealth is working on that aspect in VB right now.

[P3D4T0R]

Quote: Originally Posted by 2k1Toaster

Well I am planning to make each buttons location changeable in the skin file too. Just havent done it yet.

And if RR can call a dll, and use it, then you could get the raw byte stream data. I dont know if that is what you meant by using RR. It will mean a lot of coding on your part to get that to work. I am sure you would be up to it, but I know I have a lot of code, but it is mostly configuration and extras.

And this exe can run in the system tray hidden and external programs can send commands to it. Stealth is working on that aspect in VB right now.

That's pretty much what I was going to say... doing button location and maybe a background picture would be anything but hard to do in VB (depending on the version). Speaking of that what version of VB is this built in. If its VB.OLD (vb6) i can help out a small amount, if its VB.NET 2003 or 2005 I can help out to the full extent necessary.

[greenman100]

Quote: Originally Posted by turbocad6

alright, my initial plans for this unit is going to be real simple, I'm going to be able to wake my vehicle by calling it from my cell phone, then I will be able to remote into it from anywhere, this is all independent of this board, where this board comes in is as the vehicle interface.

I will remote in to the carpc & access this exe & then be able to press a button on my remote PC connected thru the net & start the car, press another & turn on the interior lights, another to turn XY or Z on, etc... then also have a display of temperature light level, fuel level, whatever...

some of this will be very easy for me to implement, I've been planning something like this already & the way I'm going to do the engine start, door opening & windows & stuff will be directly connecting to a spare RF alarm remote with micro relays, for example to vent the widows is channel 2 for 2 seconds, while a momentary press of the same button, say 500ms, & that opens the side sliding door

I'm guessing this part is straight forward & easy enough, if the addition of servos came down the road that would be a HUGE plus & put this several more notches up there

I estimate multi-board support in June 2007, and servos to be available July 2007. No guarantee at all. The software is up to Nick, talk to him. If you want sensors or something on the board's side, talk to me.

[BiGGy]

Quote: Originally Posted by turbocad6

alright, my initial plans for this unit is going to be real simple, I'm going to be able to wake my vehicle by calling it from my cell phone, then I will be able to remote into it from anywhere

I then want it to say good monring to me in 5 different languages, tell me the current temperature in capital cities in the world. I wont it to then make me a cup of cofee, tea is its a saterday and only before 9am. I want to have a constructive conversation with it but the car can initiate it if it wants. It can also insult me if i offend it.

I also want it to drive itself to a gas station while im sleeping via raidar and gps fill its own tank buy some milk if needed (wifi sensor in the fridge), pay for it(electronically wifi) and drive back into my garage and close the door behind it. I wont it also impulsively change body colour and pattern respectively to what state of mind im in. can it do that?

lol jokes. Real simple? i think not.

h3rk and greenman100 thats for your fool proof reply. A good friend of mine is an elecy with about 30 years experience, he will help me out when it come to the electronics. I am wondering as my climate control/AC has 2 looms connected to it, with a total of about 30-40 wires. How on earth would I find out what each one does. Im thinking of an automated system, say a humidity sensor, if its below a certain level it will open a windows or 2, if it high humidity and/or temperature then it will close windows and turn on climate control/AC.

[h3rk]

Quote: Originally Posted by BiGGy

I then want it to say good monring to me in 5 different languages, tell me the current temperature in capital cities in the world. I wont it to then make me a cup of cofee, tea is its a saterday and only before 9am. I want to have a constructive conversation with it but the car can initiate it if it wants. It can also insult me if i offend it.

I also want it to drive itself to a gas station while im sleeping via raidar and gps fill its own tank buy some milk if needed (wifi sensor in the fridge), pay for it(electronically wifi) and drive back into my garage and close the door behind it. I wont it also impulsively change body colour and pattern respectively to what state of mind im in. can it do that?

lol jokes. Real simple? i think not.

h3rk and greenman100 thats for your fool proof reply. A good friend of mine is an elecy with about 30 years experience, he will help me out when it come to the electronics. I am wondering as my climate control/AC has 2 looms connected to it, with a total of about 30-40 wires. How on earth would I find out what each one does. Im thinking of an automated system, say a humidity sensor, if its below a certain level it will open a windows or 2, if it high humidity and/or temperature then it will close windows and turn on climate control/AC.

Go to your local automotive shop and bring some doughnuts to the master technician back at the shop (you may have to sneak around back there). You'll know who the right guy to ask is, just look for the biggest MAC toolbox. Then ask him if he would get you the full wiring diagram for your car's AC system (specify make model and GS, RS, etc., whether it's automatic or manual AC) and maybe you'll get lucky. I'd send you one, but your car isn't made for sale in USA, so I can't.

Oh, and don't forget to add infrared and xray sensors so the car can drive around the back of the building and tell you the location and number of all the bad guys, and where they're hiding the hot chick with big 80's hair, whom they're holding hostage. I really wish they had a knight rider smiley.

[h3rk]

Quote: Originally Posted by turbocad6

... but there also must be a status feedback of some sort, like a way to know & display whether a window is actually open or closed, this data can come from an input I'm guessing, ...

How r u planning on 'waking' the car?

I've had very similar plans. Once you get this started, start a thread for it, I'd be interested in this project, and would be willing to help.

I think instead of having to hook up limit switches in the door for window position feedback, you could access the time out, or current level to the window motor methods already employed by auto manufacturers. It would be a relatively simple circuit to build, and you won't have to worry about moving parts to align. But that circuit should still probably send a signal to one of the digital outputs 1= window open, 0=window closed. This would reduce the system's reliance on code to accomplish some of the logic involved. I'll work on this some, and maybe come up with a solution for the few standard window control methods shown in DEI's instructions.
(So much for automerged doubleposts)

[BiGGy]

Quote: Originally Posted by h3rk

Go to your local automotive shop and bring some doughnuts to the master technician back at the shop (you may have to sneak around back there). You'll know who the right guy to ask is, just look for the biggest MAC toolbox. Then ask him if he would get you the full wiring diagram for your car's AC system (specify make model and GS, RS, etc., whether it's automatic or manual AC) and maybe you'll get lucky. I'd send you one, but your car isn't made for sale in USA, so I can't.

aus export my car to the states under the badge Mitsubishi Diamante. Though the climate control by Mitsubishi at the time was put in many of there cars. I think the lancer had it as an option and the GTO.

[turbocad6]

hey man, I'm not talking rocket science here, waking the carpc is as easy as taking a pager & having it trip a timer that brings the pc up for 20 minutes or so, have you seen pagers now a day, like $15 a year for service...

when my pc comes up it automatically gets an online connection cause my kr-1 router boots at the same time....

when the pc comes up it will communicate with the servers at www.gotomypc.com, I can connect from anywhere in the world directly to the carpc 2 minutes after I call my pager #.... this is slightly simpler than having the car drive for me & do shopping & stuff

when I connect, it's just like I'm at the pc, so I can do anything, including activating this module... simple... theres nothing to this & it could be done in an afternoon really...

having this module control a spare remote for a system that is already in place & functional makes this even easier, all it has to do is "press a button" for a pre determined period of time to activate the desired function...


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the software end of this, & the skinnability & configurability is what's going to make this thing a huge sucess, I wasn't talking about me directly interfacing the dll & writing my own code with the rr skin, I was thinking more like if your program could be feed a command & then having a button in rr issue that command, I don't know squat about programming though, so I don't know if that's a possibility... I guess the best way would be skinning your program, but with the ability to add & move button commands around on a skin, then maybe a button could take you to another page with buttons, the whole program wouldn't need to be like that, & the default config & setup screens can remain as is, but the actual user page or pages being skinnable & configurable would be sweeeet

[Ruffy]

You said a volume control is doable in the first post. You have got to sell an addon like the phidget encoder for this! Basic control that everyone and their mother needs.

[greenman100]

Quote: Originally Posted by Ruffy

You said a volume control is doable in the first post. You have got to sell an addon like the phidget encoder for this! Basic control that everyone and their mother needs.

We will have one, it will take up two inputs, either analog or digital, your choice. It will cost between 10 and 15 dollars. Probably June 2007.

[h3rk]

With a digital input, lets say that I have button I want to use to raise a parameter, like volume, by a value of 1. It would be nice if, by holding the button for 2 seconds the volume went up at a specified rate.

With analog inputs lets say I have 3 I plan on using. For this example, temperature, voltage, and amps. It would be nice to have a group of settings I could use with that input to equate:

(these example are rough and meaningless in nature to real applications)

1. Temperature - 1V to 5V = 32F to 128F with settings for sensors with a positve or negative temperature coefficient.
2. Voltage - .5V to 5.2V = 0V to 12V
3. Amps - 20mV to 100mV = 1A to 15A

So a control to select Units, and high and low equivalents, with a negative coefficient selection. Units, I guess would be string values.

[2k1Toaster]

Quote: Originally Posted by h3rk

With a digital input, lets say that I have button I want to use to raise a parameter, like volume, by a value of 1. It would be nice if, by holding the button for 2 seconds the volume went up at a specified rate.

With analog inputs lets say I have 3 I plan on using. For this example, temperature, voltage, and amps. It would be nice to have a group of settings I could use with that input to equate:

(these example are rough and meaningless in nature to real applications)

1. Temperature - 1V to 5V = 32F to 128F with settings for sensors with a positve or negative temperature coefficient.
2. Voltage - .5V to 5.2V = 0V to 12V
3. Amps - 20mV to 100mV = 1A to 15A

So a control to select Units, and high and low equivalents, with a negative coefficient selection. Units, I guess would be string values.

This will be coming, but is not done yet. This requires either parsing an equation or setting defalt values differently. The current temperature sensor we have is hard programmed in there for instance.

It is expected to be done between beta testing and release.

- Nick

[P3D4T0R]

i was wondering about an update on the ETA of the boards (I really am impatient)... Also with the latest update to StreetDeck Iv had to ditch the program I was building, so I will probably try integrating the program strait into StreetDeck or use the DLL that Fusion Brain will provide... or something in between.