A Linux Machine For Your Collar

MadSaxon writes "gumstix.org has a brief but titillating description of a very small Linux machine based on the PXA255: 20 x 80 mm, '64MB SDRAM, 4MB Flash, MMC/SD/SDIO slot, and power management. It takes 3.6V - 5.0V power, and has been drawing under 200 mA.' It weighs less than 12g sans battery, and 'can fit in a collar undetected.' Is collar-top computing the Next Big Thing?"

Laundry advice?

So, if your collar is wired, do you dry clean?

You've got token ring around the collar!

Re:Laundry advice?

I think it a poor description. The people who'd be interested in something like this rarely wear anything but T-shirts...

Unless they mean a collar with a buckle and a D-ring...

What Distro ?

Red Neck Hat?

Wearable Linux

I'm sure there's a "Slacksware" joke in here somewhere, but I'm not quite awake enough to make it. :)

Re:Wearable Linux

I think you mean 'is that a gnu in your pocket?'

Collar?

Ok.. why? I mean is there something about being in a collar that being in a pocket or a belt buckle can't do?

Well yes actually think about it.

You keep your neck undented. Things in my pocket have to survive me bending over and such. The connectors on portable players always get damaged because of that. Same with the antenna's on old phones. Add to it your keys, loose change and handkerchief and you got a hostile enviroment.

Belt? Even worse in many ways. In a working enviroment things tend to snag. And if you are crawling around after wires this is not nice.

So yeah the collar would be an intresting spot. A safe place on the body. How often do you bump your hips into something and how often your throath?

Of course the original reference was humorous intended but I just dislike it when people automatically snub an idea just because they refuse to think for a second about a new possibilty.

I don't think the throat is the best spot for it.

I don't know about you, but my company's payroll department is staffed exclusively by ninjas. I can't even begin to count the number of times I've gone to get my paycheck and gotten a throat punch.

They broke my pta (personal throat assistant) right when I got there, and I had to buy something else.

Management

I see management giving all their employee's one of these. Well, right after the little shock module is released for it.

"Slashdoting again?!" ... *ZAP*

Neat item

So many possibilties:

Link to these lie-detector glasses [slashdot.org] for better detection.

Card counting in Vegas.

Covert recording of conversations (low bitrate MP3?)

The chicks. Well.. maybe not the chicks..

Anyhow, this is moot. I can't recall the last time I wore a shirt with a collar.. :)

Re:What kind of collar?

or a big studded leather gothy/BSDM kind of collar?

"Slave you've been bad. Do you know what happens to bad boys?!"

"No Mistress, but wait let me google it..."

Why not wireless?

It has always struck me that putting more and more power close to people is the wrong way to go. Instead, why not make these machines effectively a "dumb terminal" and hook it in the Internet through a wireless connection, where it would interact with web services? Then, you can have a supercomputer on your side, and you wouldn't even know it.

But, I guess that goes against the post. My other thought is the social stigma associated with these things. I still get people telling me in an embarassed tone of voice that they can't remember my number any more without their cell phone handy. I see these things being huge in the area of 'intelligence augmentation' and 'external memories', if only people could accept that learning things rote is no longer something we actually have to do any more.

"Dumb" terminals are NOT the total solution

It has always struck me that putting more and more power close to people is the wrong way to go. Instead, why not make these machines effectively a "dumb terminal" and hook it in the Internet through a wireless connection, where it would interact with web services? Then, you can have a supercomputer on your side, and you wouldn't even know it.

You're exactly right, that is the way things are headed. But stop to think about the local computing power that may be required. Things like sophisticated video compression algorithms, speech recognition, and in the future perhaps an intelligent agent which sifts through data and presents useful items (think advanced version of dashboard). All of these things will need power close to the cpu. After that, Sun had it right, "The Network is the Computer". Especially for storage of data, etc. But there will always be a baseline requirement for local computing power.

Also, another idea to consider. By offloading processing power... ie, the "dumb terminal" approach, you take away the power to customize your experience. You effectively end up with an advertising receiver. You'll be powerless to access the types of information that you're interested in, and the device becomes more like a television, only capable of doing what it's preprogrammed to. Most people will not go to the effort to set up their own web services to connect to.

Distributed processing power is the future. But with lots of power spread out over millions of portable devices all interconnected, it becomes more of a social appliance that a number crunching system.

(I drift off topic...)

Personally what I'm most interested in are assistive agents. I think in the future you may be considered handicapped to NOT have one of these things someone on your person allowing you to tap into the global network, maybe even subconciously. Think instant google searches based on something you're thinking about, augmenting your memory automatically. Some really cool stuff, just hope the economy keeps together so I see it happen in my lifetime.

under the collar?

Ok great the computer fits under my collar, but does it have a jack to plug right into my brain? Or must I wear those uber-geeky display glasses with a one handed keyboard to use it, which would seem to defeat the purpose of yet another ultra small computer. It seems we need to work on the interface for wearables more than anything.

Bugs need to be ironed out.

I still have some (pretty straight-forward) bugs to be ironed out but a few other friends are now diving into these.

Best to iron these out without the device still in the shirt collar. Medium starch.

looks good ... but...

... i dunno that i'd be all 'collar' about it.

i'd definitely wear one of these in my leather jacket, though.

seems like it would be a good fit for 'seams', and i can think of a million uses for linux-enabled clothes, really ... especially if i can put an 802.11g-friendly antennae thread somewhere.

combine it with todays 'bendy LCD' materials, and we could, finally, be rid of the package-gadget dilemna forever. (clothes become computing devices.)

"hi, i'm home, its me, this is my pgp key, turn on the lights and wake up the studio ..."

"constant-slashdot feed, on my collar lcd..."

"location-based websites" - now, here is an idea whose time has come: an internet based entirely on -physical- proximity.

who knows, maybe devices like this could save the music industry. if my clothes walked away with legit .mp3s' of the concert i just attended, i'd attend more concerts.

How About a Watch?

Put this in a watch and I will buy one.

I've been looking for a geeky watch. The IBM Linux watch doesn't look like it is ever going to come out.

Add a tiny color touch screen, some buttons and a tiny speaker/mic.

The SD slot has lots of possibilities (I mean other than "wrist pr0n").

the RIAA scenario

"yes, we searched his entire apartment and couldn't find anything but a wireless router...but we know he's sharing mp3s somehow. Kept thumbing his collar....weird kid."

Grey Matter

Is collar-top computing the Next Big Thing?

Why not? For many, it'd be the only processing power above the neck.

Super-office-guy!!!

Man, if I link this to a voice recognition program for numbers and math terms, add a display in your sleeve or like a HUD inside your glasses, and I could have a voice activated calculator, and totally impress chicks and others when doing complex equations right infront of them: "Hey M, what's the total liability for the period 1972 through 1989 if we owed $6,998,973.20 calculated at a compounded interest of 6%?" "It's THREE! Wait, oh shit, DragonSpeak failed."

Obvious rebuttal

Is collar-top computing the Next Big Thing?

No, it isn't.

JUST IMAGINE

a Beowulf cluster of th+++NO CARRIER

wrong OS

Clearly this thing shouldn't run linux, but instead some form of MacOS, just because there's no way I can reliably click one of two buttons with my adam's apple, but I could probably manage it with just the one.

I'm still waiting for nostril-embedded computers

I hope the keyboard plug is PS/2 - - not USB! Ouch!

What self-respecting Linux geek...

What self-respecting Linux geek wears a shirt with a collar?

The secret of Dilbert's necktie.

Hmm, combine that computer with this [slashdot.org] flexible display technology (running a flashy screensaver) and put anyone else's loud tie to shame.

Or just use the tie as your monitor, although it'd have to curl up so you could read it more easily. Now what nerd do we know that wears a curling up necktie...

Surprised at such little insight

I'm surprised that this advancement is reduced to a joke. I've been waiting for a small form factor os capable platform for some time. The closest I've seen are the 5 1/4 SBCs. My goal is to use these devices for autonomous control of radio controlled aircraft. Personal UAV :) Given the lower power requirements and very low weight, this platform can be combined with an OOPIC sensor interface and gimbal sensors + GPS to do the job. Now if I can get it for less than $100. Combine 20 and have your own battle of Britian :)

Step #2! Earth Final Conflict GlobalComms

OMG that's smaller than my Nokia 3590 "ATT GoPhone" by a factor of six! With the QVGA Fexible display, all we need now is power, display control, WiFi, and battery!!!

Google cache

Seems like they either prepared their site for the /. effect or they initially were out to sell this stuff but reconsidered. Take a look at the google cache here [216.239.37.104] and here [216.239.37.104] where you can find out more about prices and specifications.

Other places for wearable Linux computers

Collars, you say? Wait 'til they have Linux-powered codpieces. Just be specific when you ask someone about his uptime.

National Security, TSA

If a Woman can be kept off a plane for a heated jacket with wires protruding, how are geeks going to explain to airport security why their shirts are beeping?

Linux And Collars

Is collar-top computing the Next Big Thing?

Hmm...given that this device is based on Linux and us Linux folks hate to wear collars, I give them poor odds of finding a market! :-)

Re:This

How is this letarded? It seems quiet clever to me... Oh, wait, you meant the other rhyme...

Re:So It's a PDA

Yeah, I agree at this point it's little more than a geekier-looking PDA, but it would be cool if he could somehow come up with a screen that wears like glasses and some sort of small, one-handed input device.

I think people should start working on smaller, more convenient interfaces rather than smaller computers, because we have some pretty ridiculously small computers out already.