[A83] Re: keyboard mem


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[A83] Re: keyboard mem




At 23:49 2001-10-31, you wrote:

>No, not at all.  The PC keyboard is a clocked serial interface, similiar to
>most other serial devices.  You don't have to deal with this when
>programming for a PC, because the PC has hardware to read the keyboard and
>generate the scan codes.  I'm sure someone has worked out a keyboard
>interface for a calc, but I don't remember one offhand.  You'd need a PIC or
>something similiar to read the keyboard, because you couldn't just hook it
>up to the calc.  There was a presentation this year at DEF CON about a
>simple microcontroller kit, and the example application was to interface
>with a keyboard.  There were some cool ideas, like capturing keys in
>hardware.  Unfortunately, they still don't have archives up for this year,
>and I don't remember the name of the kit (should have taken better notes).

You can hook it up to the calc directly. Actually the port pins are perfect 
for hooking up a keyboard.
But you need an external battery or something, to power the keyboard.
But besides that, no hardware needed. More programming work on the calc 
though.
If you go for the microcontroller version, you can make it use the remote 
function on the calc to controll it. This would make it easier to make it 
compatible with more calcs, since it is less work to adapt the 
sendprotocol, then to rewrite the entire driver.
But hooking it up directly ofcourse opens new possibilities, except just 
doing exactly the things you can do with the keyboard on calc. Maybe start 
your favorite 4 apps with a single press on F9-F12.


>I'm sure with a little searching on Google you can find some hardware to do
>it.  Also, check out this FAQ:
>
>http://www.arne.si/~mauricio/Kbdfaq.htm

This is a very good faq. Has used it in all my keyboard experiments :)

///Olle





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