Topic: Features you would want to have handy.

To me an Alarm clock has always been 10-20 years behind on the technology curve... I completely relate to your concept of bringing it up to date.

Things an Alarm Clock in the era of pocket PCs (which are like 1/10th the size of your typical alarm clock and have to contain thier own battery pack) should be able to do.

Voice Recognition.... it shouldn't be on all the time.  for 5 minutes after the alarm goes off it should be willing to accept a command.

"Snooze 5" -  5 minute snooze

"Snooze 10" - 10 minute snooze

"Snooze 15" - 15 minute snooze

"plan b" - switch to a pre-determined alarm time.  For instance if you normally jog before work so get up at 6:30 you could have plan B to compensate for not jogging... in other words it would switch to 7 or 7:30 depending on what plan b was set to

"Alarm Off"

"Day" - text to speech day of the week.

"events" - reach into a sync'd calander and read via text to speech the appointments planned. (if use desires)

"Time" - text to speech time

"Weather" - RSS feed from like theweatherchannel.com or something read via text to speech for a predefined zip code.

"Lights" - for people with "home commander" type internet lighting... it should turn on the lights in the bedroom.

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You should be able to set the alarm to do the following

Sounds
1.) MP3
2.) Radio
3.) Annoying buzz
4.) MPEG movie?
5.) News web video feed?

Modes - current alarms are DUMB.  I have to tell them it is the weekend... it shouldn't be that way.
1.) Work week (M-F)
2.) Every day
3.) Single run
4.) Custom day routine.

It should of course have a battery backup... goes without saying.

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Set Time - FROM MILITARY SITES OR ATOMIC CLOCK (or even Chumby.com). - Why would I have to set the time when the thing has a connection to the net?

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Phone Directory, web-based (VoIP) service, skype, voice activated dialing.

Phone Disable - I'd like this think  to be so patched into your VoIP service that you have powers over it... or even just a phone pass-through where you plug a land-line into it and it can dial the phone but also at night it would interrupt the "ring" and basically put the phone in silent mode until your alarm went off.  Let some other phone ring... just not the one next to the bed.

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Blue tooth - basically to get a keyboard and mouse on it if you really wanted.

Network access to a windows domain.

Ability to remote console to it from a regular machine on the network.

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Still thinking about the rest.

Re: Features you would want to have handy.

Some sort of IM thing might also be nice...

I know it doesn't have a keyboard. but maybe a way to just read the messages you have and to notifiy the sender you are currently on a chumby and will have to respond later (like free advertising ;-p )

or

maybe a couple pre defined phrases you can pick from like the old pager days "I'M ON MY WAY!", "YES", "NO", "OK" that kind of stuff.  User definable phrases... maybe a total of 25 phrases.

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Bittorent client designed to store the data on a USB or network drive.  Sometimes you decide to download something and you don't feel like walking across the house to start it... Or you don't have a laptop and you do have a chumby AND a extrenal HD... and you are setting off for a vacation at a hotel with internet access.

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I noticed you have "panda cam" and stuff like that... it might be nice to have direct relay from say a wireless x10 (do they still make those?  I never see the ads anymore..." that you have mounted on your porch or in a baby nursery so that you can see what is going on without getting up.  I don't have these devices but I wouldn't really want my x10 shots of myself from back when I was getting up at 3am and wandering around in my underwear half asleep to check on a kid being broadcast to the net and then from there being sent to the chumby... I would want to skip the i-net part.  I would then suggest selling a camera that worked very well with your set-up like pre-configured at a marked up rate as a baby monitoring package.

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Who knows... maybe I'm not done thinking yet...  I may be back.  I know you won't want ALL of these ideas... but even if you find ONE you like... it's worth the time I spend babbling.

Re: Features you would want to have handy.

Extending this a bit...

You could have programmable squeeze sensors...or a hot spot on the screen...three rapid squeezes means "wake me up in 30 mins"...one squeeze is "alright, i heard ya, i'm getting up already"...

If the widget sends me an interesting MAKE project on RSS, have an option to send it to your desktop computer (or chumby online reading folder - that would mean server space) for later reading....usually you'd want to view the project photos on the big screen...Or perhaps bookmark things to read later by clicking a check box...the article link could be sent to your desktop.

OR!!!!! Even more creative! The links and descriptions get set into an attractive webzine like format and emailed to you as your morning's "Chumby Times"...like a newspaper you put together for yourself for reading with your coffee...I have a Bloglines folder called "Angie's Breakfast" for this...all my favourite feeds are there but I don't have the functionality to pick out just the stories I want to read...currently I bookmark them and do a save all tabs in a daily folder in Firefox...personally I enjoy waking up in the morning to the content I want/think is interesting/funny...will give me something to amaze my friends and my boss...be the first with all the goss...that is super life-enhancing technology!!

I think I just had a brilliant idea!  Alarm clock plus morning newspaper creation tool....

(I will take an employment offer...royalties...payment in chumbys big_smile )

Maybe Skoshi and me should be your marketing managers!

Keep babbling Skoshi...I'm enjoying your posts.

Re: Features you would want to have handy.

Bah I had typed something here and then must have closed the window to avoid an end-user seeing me LOL.

Anyway here is another feature....

EXTERNAL NOTIFICATION PORT

This would be an on/off style trigger signal that would prompt an external device to do something... and possibly like USB level power to drive it... whatever you can easily spare.

So this would allow a modder to trigger a device... maybe it's a coffee maker... maybe it's a disco light... maybe it's an R2D2 shell that has a light up eye and a head that rotates as it chirps out inane babble... who cares... that's up to the modding community to decide right?

Now any "alarm" that can be set should be able to also trigger "external effect" so like if you get an e-mail from hotpants@gmail.com R2D2 could be visually excited (the chirpping noises and head rotating... PERVERTS!) which would be a cool and entertaining mod to have.

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Snap in shell.... the Chumby should be designed so that it can easily be snapped into certain mods that cater to it's shell.  like say you have 4 notches at the top and bottom of the shell.. and if a modder but 4 rubber nubs in the same pattern and had a semi ridgid frame to hold the nubs tight you could simply snap the chumby in... it wouldn't be like throw it around the room secure... but it should be sit on your nightstand secure.

You could sell the rigid frame with the rubber nubs pre-made to modders... call them "chumby sockets" or something.

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With the 2 mods I listed in this particular message (of me talking to myself and having Angela listen in) you could really put a huge boost in the modding community by not only making it easy for Chumby to be moved from "shell to shell" but to allow the shell to do so much more than just contain chumby by using an external notification and low end power source to drive a tiny motor or light sequence.

Part of any good electronic device is it's accessories... as you have obviously noted in your subscription plan to the advanced services.  Think about a cell phone... if a phone was awesome but didn't have any cases designed for it.. or a car charger it would impact your decision to buy it.  A Chumby with a cool unique shell could infact be much cooler than a plain chumby.... this cool unique shell might get that person a moderate level of "hacking fame" and then maybe he would mass produce the shell.  People might then really enjoy his shell enough that it is part of the reason they buy a Chumby.

The need to make the port and the method for securing the chumby univeral is that no one can mass distribute a "Chumby shell" if it requires the users to mail thier Chumby to them to make the modifications... people simply avoid mailing expensive electronics through the mail for modification by someone of undetermined skill level.  Yes someone will probably open it up and hack it real good... 10x better than the "external notification port" and "chumby socket" will allow... BUT... it will never be done on a large scale.

Re: Features you would want to have handy.

Angela after your comments I had another idea... How about a chumby portal?

What I mean is that your chumby has an online presence like chumby.com/users/Skoshi

if I went to that site my Chumby will have set some stuff up for me... first of all if he can retrieve the weather from an RSS feed that will be there... and if I have squeezed him to do the "morning bookmarks" like you have mentioned... those will be there in another section... and my calander... and my contacts... and everthing else I pretty much set up on Chumby.

Think of it as a Chumby controlled "personalized google home page" or "my msn page".  Except that your little buddy Chumby is helping you keep track of it.

IMHO if I was to set something like this up... I'd talk to Google.  I'd be like "hey guys... I have this piece of hardware that sits on the web and replaces a clock... you know.. Chumby.. COME ON  SAY MY NAME B#%#TCH!  So anyway I want to make him impact someone's home page.. thier portal to the internet.  You currently have a great portal  What I would like is for you to add a couple features and help me get this thing to talk to your site.  My users visit you more... and you help me get more users by providing a resource people already know.... we should both win on this one."

Oh... and you really shouldn't encourage me Angela... my brain works in very strange and demented ways.

Re: Features you would want to have handy.

Oops.. another idea.

Slingbox http://www.slingmedia.com/indexa.php

This thing converts and transmits your TV over the net.... you should have a Chumba client for this... why?  I dunno... it's just cool.

Re: Features you would want to have handy.

OK, back up a little. (Gentle hint: Have you had a look at the developer pages, yet?)

Skoshi wrote:

Now any "alarm" that can be set should be able to also trigger "external effect" so like if you get an e-mail from hotpants@gmail.com R2D2 could be visually excited (the chirpping noises and head rotating... PERVERTS!) which would be a cool and entertaining mod to have.

Um...you could buy a Nabaztag...or check out MAKE for a mood light mod...someone put different colour LEDs in an Ikea lamp and rigged it to light up different colours for different people's email notifications...

Skoshi wrote:

Snap in shell.... the Chumby should be designed so that it can easily be snapped into certain mods that cater to it's shell.

I think Joe Grand already had that idea...the hardware is behind a bezel that can be removed from a rubber frame. The "sockets" are made of TPE which is sewable and TPU which is gluable. Putting it in and out of different mod surrounds will be easy for crafty types...but maybe not so easy for the general populace...which is a fantastic opportunity that Chumby Industries has given hackers to create a mini-business (if I understand this correctly).

Skoshi wrote:

A Chumby with a cool unique shell could infact be much cooler than a plain chumby.... this cool unique shell might get that person a moderate level of "hacking fame" and then maybe he would mass produce the shell.  People might then really enjoy his shell enough that it is part of the reason they buy a Chumby.

Shhhhhh!!!!!! Stop giving my plans away.... wink I have a plan for easy shell attachment and reattachment...but I'm  not advertising it at the minute. Most crafters will figure out a simple way quite quickly, I think. There will be multiple solutions to this. But I really hope the Chumby team doesn't incorporate them because the surround will lose it's flexibility to be modded. It is great now, very OpenSourceCrafting compliant...the more notches it has the more proprietary the device becomes. Think of all the screwdriver bits you need to open console cases etc. That is what the Chumbians are trying to avoid with this device...consider it a social statement as well as an appliance.

Also, if they do add a universal way to connect it, they will have people mass producing cheap chumby covers in China for two dollar shops...if there is an attachment system that is unique to a designer, people are more likely to come back to that designer to purchase extra covers, if they like their work. The designer should buy the TPE/TPU surrounds direct from the Chumbians wholesale and be allowed to mod and resell...just the casing parts...not talking about electronics here. Chumby supports cottage industry and cottage industry supports Chumby. And ChumbyCorp. doesn't sue the crap out of people like some big, ugly corporations I can think of....  (at least that's the vision).

(Can a Chumbian please comment on the parts availability issue? I brought it up before but didn't get an answer.
Also, chat to the lawyers and give us guidelines before we get our hopes up too far re: modding plans....Thank you smile ).

Re: Features you would want to have handy.

Skoshi wrote:

Angela after your comments I had another idea... How about a chumby portal?

What I mean is that your chumby has an online presence like chumby.com/users/Skoshi

I had this thought too. But I actually think it is in existence, already. The boys have plans to have virtual chumby to test things on...also the mychumby page on chumby.com should work something like this, I'm guessing.

But.....I'm wondering about the issues re: server space/bandwidth etc. and costs involved in the start up phase of the business. I wonder if an application etc can sit on the home network to manage this....or if your teaming up idea would work...with Google, Yahoo etc....but legally its much more fun to stay independent....particularly when your little and they're big.

I'd be interested in Chumbian comment on this. (Maybe you should put the release date back to Q207 just so you can answer all my forum questions? wink )

Skoshi wrote:

Oh... and you really shouldn't encourage me Angela... my brain works in very strange and demented ways.

Hmmm...seems to be a familiar problem....

Re: Features you would want to have handy.

Great comments, you guys.  And we're right with you smile

Lots of the things you are suggesting are already underway, others we encourage you to add, either through widgets, through hardware hacking or crafting.

And re: modding, go nuts!  That's the whole point: make your chumby original and show it to the world.

Cheers.

Re: Features you would want to have handy.

Thanks Steve.

Angela I agree being independent would be better but the bandwidth that might be needed for the chumby to update it's own website might be too much... and I don't know exactly what Google would ask for in return for modding thier custom homepages concept a little bit.  The thought is that Google would probably do it just to be more compatible than Microsoft and lure more people in.

Also about the Chumby sockets... I'm not talking about special tools... I'm talking about a little frame that is designed to snuggle up to Chumby.. something that could be mass produced for like $2.  All the tools SHOULD be standard.  All the frame does is hold chumby in place without the sewing or glue which is more permanent.  I don't personally like the idea of putting glue on my Chumby.  I would glue the $2 frame in and snap the chumby into it.

Re: Features you would want to have handy.

these all sound like great ideas, but i think voice recognition is a bit too much for a chumby. if the whole thin client idea goes through, then its a possibility, but on out-of-the-box chumby, prolly not.

although, you could do claps. say one clap shuts it up, two snoozes for 5 mins, 3 for ten etc.

need upload space for the forums or a chumby blog? right here then
http://www.nophus.com/useru
username is chumby
password is chumby