🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Dec20.212105.13649@ksmith.uucp> keith@ksmith.uucp (Keith Smith) writes:
> My Idea of *IDEAL* for *ANY* machine would be a system of snap-together
> lego (tm) style blocks with an arbitrary length bus.  Blocks would have
> a defined size (Say 6" square?) one block being a "mother-block"
> Each block could be snapped on or off the "bus" at will with all the
> neccessary connection pins / controls on the front or back edges of the
> block.  Blocks should/could be stackable, with larger blocks obviously
> on the bottom of a stack.

I've seen two versions of this: one successful, one less so. The Convergent
Technology bookshelf unit is a very nice design, with a positive mechanical
lock and no arbitrary limits to the bus length. The Amiga expansion port is
less successful, because it has no lock and the signal definition was never
designed for multiple piggybacks. The original Amiga design would have been
much better: basically stacked units with a bus running vertically up the
back of the stack, using gravity for locking. It was abandoned because it
would have added a several dollars to the cost of manufacturing a $1500 PC.

I'd like to see the bus specifics decoupled from the software, so you had
some sort of interface that you told "go to unit so-and-so and send this
control/read this data". Then you could use a low-cost hookup with ethernet
type cables, or a high-speed bus type option, without impacting the software.
You could even plug a low-speed adaptor into a high speed bus to hook up
your laptop when you get home.

If course this would logically be a LAN (um, CAN: Computer Area Network?).

> <SIGH>  not in my lifetime I suppose.

Go get a Burroughs/CT bookcase unit. UHaul uses them here in Houston, or
call your local Unisys rep.
-- 
Peter da Silva                                            `-_-'
Ferranti International Controls Corporation                'U` 
Sugar Land, TX  77487-5012 USA
+1 713 274 5180                            "Zure otsoa besarkatu al duzu gaur?"