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Re: Wearable clothing, was Watch keyboard?

From: "R. Paul McCarty" <>
Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2000 21:39:06 -0500 (EST)

On Wed, 5 Jan 2000, Charles J Knight wrote:

> > > By micro, I mean something appx 1/4 the size of the HPLX series
> > > keyboards, and wrist mounted.  This would be the size of an
> > > 
> > Thats exactly what I want to do, but Im nut sure what to use for the 
> > buttons...I saw some really small ones in the radio shack catalog 
> > but i dont know how much pressure it takes to puss them down, as I 
> > want to be able to just tap it, and not need to use my nail to push 
> > the thing down. Anyoen have suggestions for buttons?
> 
> The only thing that springs to mind, is the "credit card" organizers
> that have calculator key type buttons.  There are a few that have a
> fully QWERTY keyboard, though not the Fn-keys, etc.  Some are
> almost the right size -- a matrix printed on a PC board could go 
> underneath, and the keys usually have conductuve rubber underneath.
> That would make it "work."

I've stared at these a long moment at the counter at Radio Shack too and
thought, these would make nice tiny keyboards, but you lose me further
down..

> The matrix does not require discrete *buttons,* but only contact
> between 2 conductors.  :-)

yep, get that. :)

> Casing -- we're talking custom work.  You could always hack the
> casing from the organizer, though that's hardly ideal.  There are
> always options though.  Wood, custom plastic, fiber/epoxy, metal,
> and probably a few others I'm forgetting.

well the organizer has a small grid of buttons and probably a thin contact
board underneath that could easilly be slapped onto something more stable.
But maybe a whole new aluminum plate with holes drilled for the buttons to
sit in, but keep the original contact board would work.

> Wiring -- there's a simple bundle of wires that comes out of the 
> SIMM stick, and the cable could probably remain.  Alternately,
> it's just a serial data stream, which means it could be hacked to
> be wireless, whether it would be IR or radio is immaterial.

Okay, now you lost me. What SIMM stick are you talking about here? I
imagine the matrix contacts feed into the main board for one of those
credit card sized organizers and I doubt there is a separate encoder chip.
Even if there was it probably doesn't encode things into a nice serial
steam or ps/2 encoded stream.  But maybe it does.  Have you tried this?

-Paul

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