Customer Screen

Tech · Post by **Tech** » Tue Apr 18, 2006 11:37 am

Could this be a....

http://www.thinkgeek.com/computing/avcards/7e3e/

ibmsystems · Post by **ibmsystems** » Tue Apr 18, 2006 9:54 pm

No USB Wouldnt work and the screen it self is too small

FormicaFun · Post by **FormicaFun** » Thu Apr 20, 2006 12:11 am

Well, it could....after all most pole displays are 20 colums by 2 lines, and these are 20 colums by 4 lines.....so how exactly are they 'too small'? If anything they're too big. As far as the USB thing goes, it maybe more involved with the drivers. They seem to have the ability to display just about anything you'd need them to from emails to IM's.....so it'd just take someone who has one to play around with it. If nothing else we could always reroute the serial port to the USB port....or who knows exactly...but where there's a will....there's a way. Either way, it sure is pretty nifty. I guess we'll have to wait for Jon or someone with knowlage over Windows to explain the possibilities.

ChrisKraus · Post by **ChrisKraus** » Thu Apr 20, 2006 4:00 am

If somebody really wanted to use this, they could write their own little driver program that accesses POLE.DAT.
- Chris

Jonathan Simpson · Post by **Jonathan Simpson** » Fri Apr 21, 2006 6:03 pm

I've spoken with the people who make this device, and I'm confident it could be made to work with POS. I should know soon how much effort it would be.

Get back to ya!

FormicaFun · Post by **FormicaFun** » Sun Apr 23, 2006 4:50 am

Thanks Jon!

Jonathan Simpson · Post by **Jonathan Simpson** » Sun Apr 23, 2006 7:19 am

Ok, real simple... who's interested?

I'd like to go back with them with some level of understanding on how much interest we have.

Remember, this is a potential customer display option for only $69!, and it's got very low space, and power requirements.

Using it would almost certainly require a windows based OS, unless they are willing to build a dos driver for it (unlikely) or I can make one myself (equally unlikely).

So, whats the interest level?

Dukane · Post by **Dukane** » Sun Apr 23, 2006 8:50 am

Jon, I'd be interested!

Wes · Post by **Wes** » Sun Apr 23, 2006 9:55 am

So would I! :o)

anwoke8204 · Post by **anwoke8204** » Sun Apr 23, 2006 5:13 pm

as would I
I would really be interested in this

Dukane · Post by **Dukane** » Sun Apr 23, 2006 6:16 pm

Jon,

Correct me if I am wrong, but the POLE.DAt file is simply a text file which has the text to be written to the display in it?

So, theoretically one could write a very simple Visual Basic, C, Java, etc... program to read the data from the file and then send it to the USB port?

Dale Harris · Post by **Dale Harris** » Sun Apr 23, 2006 7:02 pm

TimLight,

That is the deal but you would have to talk to Jon about the term "simple" being appropriate.

Jonathan Simpson · Post by **Jonathan Simpson** » Mon Apr 24, 2006 9:35 am

Simple... well maybe. It depends on how good their API is, and I haven't seen it yet.

Nothing with USB is ever as simple as it was with serial. I'm gonna see what I can dig up on DOS usb cause it might be nice if it's not a huge project to build a DOS based driver for this.

Wes · Post by **Wes** » Mon Apr 24, 2006 5:05 pm

What kind of time frame do you think we would be looking at with this one?

brucef2112 · Post by **brucef2112** » Tue Apr 25, 2006 9:15 pm

Mark my vote for the 'Very interested' in this.

For those with a programmer's propeller beanie this may help in figuring
the amount of time needed to code such a *simple* project or even offer
a starting place to write some very cool LCD display code.

My programming skills drop off shortly after coding
the "Hello World" program so these may or may not be useful
to those who really code. Here are 2 links to some code examples of
writting to a LCD displaywith VB.net or Visual C#.net.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/defau ... 102003.asp
http://msdn.microsoft.com/coding4fun/so ... fault.aspx

Any body want to take a wack at building a DIY Pole Display (hardware)
for less than the $70 Pertelian External LCD Display.
Mouser Electronics has lots of 20x2 LCD displays to choose from in the $25 dollar range.
I would think that the LCD is the most expensive part of hardware
needed to build a DIY Pole display.
Just like the programming part, I'm sure this
would be *real easy* and take *nooo time* @ all.

Bruce
(warming up his soldering iron)

DHES

Customer Screen

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