I read the thread about a light sensor and think it's really a good idea for several reasons, not the least of which are that photodiodes are both simple to interface to and cheap, so the price/performance tradeoff here if even one or two reallly good applications for it are found (and several ideas have been presented) is really good.
Thinking about other similar inputs that might also be good, I came up with: * Temperature sensor - It might be able to figure out if it was in your pocket vs. in your hand vs. sitting on the desk. Again though, this is such a simple and cheap thing to add that it could, I think, be included just on the off chance someone will come up with a great use for it. * Motion sensor - lots of potential uses: shake your phone to rapidly to get to the main menu. Tilt scrolling, and application switching by tapping the sides of the phone (ala the 'Smackbook Pro' hack at http://blog.medallia.com/2006/05/smacbook_pro.html). Or maybe it should scream when you drop it to make sure you know you've dropped it so you don't leave it behind. * Consumer-level IR - too late for v1 probably, but maybe v2 ? - useful not only for docking/interfacing with printers, etc, but also for turning your phone into the ultimate TV remote :) The Agenda handheld had this feature and I've heard of people who are using the little thing for nothing *but* this - they've replaced their pile of remotes with a (now fairly dated) ~$100 linux palmtop that never loses its IR settings. * some number of plain old LEDs - useful for message-waiting indicators (for voicemail, SMS, email, and IM) for example, without having to power up the display. Bonus points for multi-color LEDs. Oh, and I was glad to hear there will be vibrate-mode hardware, but what about speakerphone? And is the touch-screen a multitouch type? or single? I've gotten quite used to the 'point with one finger, scroll with two' features on my Macbook Pro. PS: Add my vote for bluetooth. --pj _______________________________________________ OpenMoko community mailing list [email protected] http://lists.openmoko.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/community
