kosh-hardware-o summary, week of friday, december 25, 1998
 
In keeping with the official scheme of kosh scribing, this summary covers the
week from Saturday December 19th to Friday December 25th.  Things were pretty
quiet on the list during that span, possibly because of some holidays.

What was discussed this week:

Some different user-interface setups were proposed.  In one the computer
is controled by remote control and functions as an entertainment unit.
In another the computer projects its output onto a wall or screen, and
is controlled by an infared version of a drawing tablet.  Lastly the touch-
screen-in-every-room-of-the-house setup was mentioned, in which each touch
screen can control the computer. 

We looked into the "Me-chip" which does cryptography. We discussed crypography
algorithms, some of the cooler ones seeming to be Blowfish and ECC.

We talked about digital audio input devices, mentioning "break-out" boxes,
which do the a-to-d conversion outside of the computer, reducing the number
of cables going into the computer.  Right now most of these use propriatary
standards to interface between the box and the computer.  Of the available
standards USB probably doesn't have the bandwitdth for serious
multichannel audio, while FireWire may or may not be good for realtime 
transmissions.

And, in addition to last weeks discussion of autoconfiguration, it was
pointed out that SCSI also does autoconfig, along with PCI, USB, and FireWire.

As always, any questions or comments about this summary can be sent to me,
                               smurph

smurph@one.area.com