Hub on nanonote?

Uwe Dippel udippel at uniten.edu.my
Mon Aug 23 21:36:35 EDT 2010


On 08/24/2010 12:51 AM, Bas Wijnen wrote:
>
> At the moment, that is indeed not possible. AFAIK it will most likely be
> a feature of the Ya (the next version), but I don't know how long it
> will take before that is produced. It may be several years, I think.
>
> If connecting only to the serial port is not enough (plus some extra
> gpio pins or an sdio interface if you go through some trouble), then the
> current NanoNote isn't what you're looking for.
>    

Uh, I was afraid so. What a pity. Actually, IMHHO, that's the major 
letdown for too many for nanonote to have the success it deserves.

> Of course it depends a lot on what you want to teach with "embedded
> systems". I think you should be able to do a lot with only the usb
> connection.
>
> If you want more advice on what you could do with the NanoNote, I would
> really like to hear your targets (what you want them to learn). I'm a
> teacher myself, and would like to be inspired. :-)
>    

Not that I wanted to teach anything myself, but we have received funding 
from the Malaysian government to develop a kit to teach basics of 
embedded systems in secondary/technical schools. My coworkers are more 
inclined to use an existing, expensive, PIC-based breadboard solution. 
Though to me, that's something of yesterday (like in my own school 
times, with all items in a kind of suitcase).
I considered it fun, to deliberately blur the difference between 
'embedded' and 'general purpose PC' by putting the nanonote (e.g.) into 
that see-through box, to which external items can be connected. Not 
monitor, not necessarily keyboard, but ethernet, serial and parallel; 
thereby imitating a typical embedded system. With the nanonote as the 
heart of it, in the glass (plexiglas) box (which could as well contain a 
seven-segment display, some LEDs, etc.).
The total cost of each such kit could be well below US$ 300, and 
therefore be rolled out on a large scale without financial burden.

Oh well, it wasn't supposed to be then.
I know that this is daring, but I dare nevertheless: should anyone be 
able to recommend a suitable piece of hardware for our undertaking, 
please let me know.

Thanks,

Uwe





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