Topic: Feature request - disable the 'delete' button

I know you guys have only just got the service up and running again (many thanks for that), but it's reappearance reminded me of a feature I'd really love to see...

I have a 4 year old who finds the Chumbys in our house irresistible (who cam blame him!).... The problem is that that he's not afraid of experimenting with buttons, and if he gets hold of them when we're not looking he often deletes our widgets.

I know the real solution is to install more discipline in him, however being an engineer I prefer the idea of a technical fix.

I'd love to see a feature whereby certain buttons on the Chumby control panel could be disabled. I'd be happy if this was done either via a local config file on the Chumby itself or via a web interface on chumby.com.

Does anyone else think this would be useful?

M.

Re: Feature request - disable the 'delete' button

Yeah, that's a good idea - now that people are familiar with PIN lock screens (thanks to smart phones), it might be a good idea to implement on the Chumby.

One thing that has been an issue with that is how to treat the this in the past - ex. does it simply block going into the Control Panel, or does still allow things like music, alarms, etc.  Previous discussions didn't reach a consensus.

Re: Feature request - disable the 'delete' button

At the risk of bike-shedding, the Apple model of having a Lock/unlock button on each (top-level?) configuration screen might be worth considering, so the user can decide which screens should be locked. There would need to be a way to unlock a device without knowing the PIN though, maybe a reboot with a specific file on the USB, and/or still provide access to the pi menu and login via ssh.

Re: Feature request - disable the 'delete' button

I think that's where the whole idea went off the rails in product management - it seemed like adding a whole new set of complicated setting screens. and associated support calls, which cost money.

I'd have to also look at this on a per Control Panel basis - there are three of them with completely different code bases and overall structure - the one for the 3.5" devices, and one each for the two 8" devices.

I'm certainly open to the idea, need to think a bit about it.

Re: Feature request - disable the 'delete' button

I vote to get rid of the c8 control pane smile, er, I mean pain, er, I mean panel.

every time I accidentially tap it and have to squint at the glare in the dark trying to find my way back to the 'home screen' so I can find the too small 'night mode' button.... *grumble*

Cleaning up any loose bits and bytes.

Re: Feature request - disable the 'delete' button

diamaunt wrote:

I vote to get rid of the c8 control pane smile, er, I mean pain, er, I mean panel.

every time I accidentially tap it and have to squint at the glare in the dark trying to find my way back to the 'home screen' so I can find the too small 'night mode' button.... *grumble*

I second this proposal. My C8 keeps coming on in the middle of the night (I think the cat does it - she sometimes likes to sleep leaning on it because it's warm) and it is fiddly and a bit annoying to get back to night mode.

Re: Feature request - disable the 'delete' button

mine does the same thing, it appears to be a memory leak which causes the control panel to die and respawn, only, it doesn't remember that it was in night mode before it's resurrection.

I put this in /psp/crontabs/root

55 21 * * * pkill chumbyflashplayer.x
0 22 * * * /psp/nightmode.sh
30 22 * * * /psp/dark.sh

my c8 is scheduled to go into nightmode at 22:00, so I give it pre-emptive cleaning up just before.

then at 2200 it runs this from cron

#!/bin/sh
echo '<event type="NightMode" value="on" comment=""/>' > /tmp/flashplayer.event
/usr/bin/chumbyflashplayer.x -F1

and *wink* out it goes.

then at 22:30, it runs

#!/bin/sh
echo '<event type="NightMode" value="dark" comment=""/>' > /tmp/flashplayer.event
/usr/bin/chumbyflashplayer.x -F1
Cleaning up any loose bits and bytes.

Re: Feature request - disable the 'delete' button

I was thinking of something really simple - literally a single file that is read on control panel startup and allows you to specify 'enabled' or 'disabled' for each button on the home screen, and perhaps also has options for the squishy button and any form of screen tap.