This is pretty incredible. An entirely different level than the old and trusty breadboards! Love how the components just snap magnetically and load the best-matching software to support them. Looks super promising!
Arguably it would be better than current solutions because you can upgrade the modules that need upgrading while keeping the stuff that works, instead of throwing out everything and starting over.
Unless you want it to have a better computer. The computer doesn't seem modular to me. You can't quickly add additional or better memory. You can't replace the processor with a better one. The computer itself is a single entity that in many ways is less modular than a traditional desktop computer.
Wouldn't a desktop with 100 USB ports be a modular computer in the same sense as this thing?
So you are arguing this is better because you don’t have to throw it all together but then arguing throwing everything is not that bad?
At least USB has and will be supported for years. The next revision will likely be incompatible with this limited cross connector (which I admit is cool nonetheless).
No, I'm saying the modularity has limits that are defined by the use-cases this is designed for. Which seems to be smart-home applications and/or quick prototyping. A 25 dollar compute module seems like a perfectly sensible compromise to me in that context.
If you need the modularity and power of a desktop computer so you can install a boat-load of RAM or upgrade the video card, get a desktop computer.
The hardware is very cool. The start of the integration with the dashboard is neat, but I'm not entirely sure how useful it would be other than making a video like this. Perhaps something like OSC or something could help keep it modular from a software standpoint and not so toy seeming. I also think a lot of software has whole knows what layers expecting hardware to not just suddenly disappear. Appear is maybe less a thing.
Yep, looks great as a toy, but seems not-that-ok for any serious use, because for static setups, all the alternatives are a lot cheaper, because they don't have to be modular (eg. touchscreen display for controlling home automation).
But I like the concept for areas such as schools etc., because it makes it possible to try a bunch of different things very fast.
As a third generation hoarder I have to say that the number one thing preventing me from doing projects such as home automation is that since I struggle with throwing stuff out, failed/deprecated devices would just pile up and I don't want that.
The alternatives may be cheaper if you can find one that does what you want. But in terms of the ability to quickly throw something together where existing stuff doesn't quite do what you want or is locked down, it looks amazing.
In terms of "serious use" I think that depends on what you mean by "serious". E.g. my hone automation setup is not static, because I keep finding new little things I want to tweak, and often the ready-made solution lack options I'd like to have unless I'm willing to spend time tracking down very specific modules. My time is valuable to me - I'd happily pay extra for a modular system where I know if something is lacking a button for something I want I can literally just plug one in instead of having to search all over for a different model of something.
Of course this will not replace mass market "close enough" solutions.
But I think there are still more than enough people who want to tinker but don't want to have to whip out a soldering iron.
You can always get the same components that this kit uses, solder them together and do it cheaper. Want a dimmer for your smart lights? esp8266 + one of many potentiometers available + maybe an adc if you need more than one. You'll never use this whole kit just for one potentiometer, with the rest of the components in a drawer somewhere, because this would make it too expensive. Cramming multiple modules just not to "waste" them, makes you build a tool around what you have, instead of using just what you really need.
Yes, you can, but I have no interest in building my own. I don't need these things badly enough to be willing to invest much time in it.
Things like a single dimmer etc. is not the problem, because for simple stuff like that there are plenty of off the shelf options.
The issue is anything that deviates from what manufacturers expect. And yes, I'd be happy to use a lot like that for that even at a quite high cost because the existing options to do it cleanly without a self build are also expensive.
Yeah. Fairly obvious applications in teaching/education devices. Though I think it should be noted that a lot of what schools want to teach with devices like this is precisely the pin connections and circuits this thing elides.
But I am not sure about the rest.
And what you don't see in demos like this are the practical limitations that the demo avoids. I didn't watch all the way to the end but I had questions about how the device communicates its limitations and handles situations where, for example, it cannot supply enough power.
I feel like the power of this could be in something like building industrial control panels quickly? Being able to rapidly setup control boards, and equally rapidly configure them into something else would have a lot of utility in that application.
EDIT: Though that does make a key weakness the fact that there doesn't appear to be any provisioning for locking down the blocks more aggressively to the board.
I don't know that I'd go so far as to call it a toy, but I do think that this device is more likely to be used in education or prototyping than anything else - which is still great! Just having a platform that will autoconfigure the array of devices that he's demonstrated is amazing. Being able to snap on two cameras and a TPU and have everything 'just work' so you can focus on your vision processing software is incredible.
I'm betting that it will be cost-prohibitive to have this device as a permanent fixture for any one application outside outside of the sorts of things an rPi4 already does (Home Assistant server, etc). I don't think anyone is going to use it to control an LED with a slider, but for prototyping that sort of thing it has endless possibilities.
Hats off to Anil for the huge amount of work he put into this project.
The magnetic connectors is what makes it an expensive toy. The pluggable grid layout is nice but it could be achieved with a daughter board with pins sitting on top of any cheap SBC.
It would be trivial to modify the design to allow some form of locking blocks in place, whether through a sliding tile system, a lever lock, or a pin design. You could even do it yourself with 3d printing. Really depends if there's a professional environment that could use something like this. Maybe a lab or machine shop?
Sometimes the point of a technology is not its direct utility but to
carry forth or promote an idea.
Because of what's happening with climate, pollution and e-waste, the
future is modular. Modular phones, computers, cars and even nuclear
reactors.
Having this kind of thing in schools helps kids get used to the idea
that technology is configurable at the physical level without
electronics skills.
Strong interoperability legislation should be a part of technology
going forward. Industry will welcome and adapt to it because it's
ultimately a better compromise than tougher regulation and export
controls.
> Because of what's happening with climate, pollution and e-waste, the future is modular. Modular phones, computers, cars and even nuclear reactors.
Sounds cool, but the reality is that in order to get the best efficiency, you often want a purpose-built, specialized design. In the case of electric cars, you need your car to be very light and to have a very integrated design in order to maximize energy efficiency. I'm not sure what you mean by a modular car design, but you definitely can't fit any motors with any battery in any frame, that will just make for a car with terrible performance.
That being said, we should be designing things to maximize lifetime, and we should probably ban certain materials or construction techniques that make recycling difficult. Maybe we need to ban or heavily tax non-recyclable materials. We could also do more to build a legal framework around right to repair.
> Having this kind of thing in schools helps kids get used to the idea that technology is configurable at the physical level without electronics skills.
Kids is probably the best use case. As someone who makes things I look at this product and I think it's necessarily going to be more expensive and less flexible compared to alternatives. For kids though, this can be a gateway to make electronics less scary.
> Strong interoperability legislation should be a part of technology going forward. Industry will welcome and adapt to it because it's ultimately a better compromise than tougher regulation and export controls.
I agree. We should be strongly promoting (and maybe legally mandating) open, documented standards for everything.
The alternative is a Raspberry Pi with a USB webcam and sensors you can buy on AliExpress for a few dollars a piece. You can get your hands on that now.
> I'm not sure what you mean by a modular car design, but you definitely can't fit any motors with any battery in any frame, that will just make for a car with terrible performance.
Not any in any, but some in some is already possible, some Renault cars share parts for example with Dacia. But other companies tweak their design each yer, they change how the head lights look, shapes change, then some other inside parts shape needs to change so you got people having to redesign, re-test each year new filters and piping/hosing (this is the ones I am familiar with), Other shitty thing that happens is patents, some company gets a patent for some pretty obvious thing, now if you want to make spare parts for those cars you need to work around dose patents - a lot of work and expenses to be able to offer a different choice to the consumer.
The reason the engines and other parts can't be share is design and recently DRM, for sure you won't be able to install unofficial wheels on your fancy car without breaking some DRM protection(but is for your safety /s).
As far as I can tell, this is a single individual that has done all of this work. I am floored at the design and intricacy of this project.
Really, truly blown away. I'm sure there are plenty of edge cases to correct for but I haven't gotten so excited by a demo in a long time. I've obviously signed up to learn more.
1 person? Man it's an absolutely incredible feat. I'm also blown away, and I want to play around with it. I would love to try and automate parts of the house and such.
Pockit is just one of the small parts needed to automate parts of your house. All your devices have to cooperate smoothly and this will require a standardized IoT API from manufacturers.
However, the most complex and costly part is the PCB and circuit design. The PCBs used in the blocks are absolutely awesome.
Thanks to 3D printers that are cheap, the casing and other plastic materials are easy to make.
All that being said, this has very low chance of becoming a real world product. Real world is messy, dirty, wet and an absolutely shitty place for snap on electronics.
What would work, is better connector technology. It is obvious that even with all this simplification, this will still be a hobbyist product, rather than a serious mass market product.
The way to that cyberpunk world that lives in collective imagination is to make electronics work in messy, dirty, wet environments, not try to shield them from it.
Hey can we use like solarpunk or something instead for our collective imaginations? We’ve been kicking the tires on this cyberpunk thing for the last decade or two and it turns out they wrote that shit as a dystopia, so, it’d be good if we could like collectively Not build that part together.
> Merveilles seems aligned with the ideals of Solarpunk while internally expecting the world of Cyberpunk, it is neither a utopian or dystopian vision, but a way of straddling both contingencies.
Oh man, thank you for that - so good in so many ways. I’ll definitely be following up on this later, I like what they’re doing.
Two things stick out for critique to me -
> Merveilles seems aligned with the ideals of Solarpunk while internally expecting the world of Cyberpunk, it is neither a utopian or dystopian vision, but a way of straddling both contingencies.
I get this, and in a way, I think it’s how I’m operating already, but man, it’s an art movement - don’t give the dystopia space in the room, it’s already got plenty everywhere else.
> The Merveilles visual aesthetic restricts color palettes to black and white, vector or pixel art, with at most a single accent color (usually a sea-foam aqua). Industrial design is minimalist, geometric black-forged metals, natural wood.
My visual aesthetic these days is “all of the above.” For the love of god, colors exist - trillions of them! Take two! Hell, take three or four! They’re cheap! And shapes - my god, man, the shapes you can make! You ever see the temple carvings in Nepal? So many shapes! Take a walk through a forest, and just look at all the shapes! Look at trees, man - the opposite of simple!
I don't see why the contacts on the demonstrated devices would be any more vulnerable to the real world than the port on an iPhone. I'm not sure these devices would be mass market since some skill is required to understand and use the software but they would absolutely have a good run at serving the same size market as 3D printers. They could even work hand in hand with 3D printers by providing the 'brains' for prototyped projects.
Connectors are usually built so there is a small amount of "wiping" as they seat, which will scrape off oxides or dirt. They will also have just the right amount pressure to balance longevity versus contact resistance. The pockit connectors may not balance these factors well (depends on what's making contact from the modules - I couldn't find the details readily). Regardless they won't have wiping, which isn't mandatory but is the cheapest way to keep connections reliable.
So likely they won't have nearly the cycle life of USB-C but do they really need to?
Besides the wiping, these connectors are missing two other features: ESD protection and connection-sequencing.
Most user-facing connectors have a metal shield around them connected to frame ground. The idea is that any ESD shock goes safely through this first instead of to a sensitive data line.
Connection-sequencing ensures that the ground and power is connected before data lines are. If you look inside a cable-side USB connector, you'll see that the inner two wires (data) are recessed a little so that the power connectors go first. A device that is connected without power can (through its ESD protection circuit) attempt to draw power from data lines... this can cause damage because most data lines can't supply the current to power the entire device.
You don't know if they ESD protection or not. There are loads of tiny little ESD protection ICs/diodes that can handle many inputs. Just put them very close to the connectors and you should be good to go from an ESD perspective. You don't need a metal shield around everything to protect against ESD.
Every USB device connected to your PC right now probably has a little ESD protection IC in it. Usually sitting right next to the USB connector (as close as possible).
I think you could effectively connection sequence this interface? Though it'd be electronic sequencing rather than a physical one like on usb ports, you could make it so that a particular non-symmetrical set of pins need to be in a certain position before power is delivered through any power pins. Assuming there are multiple grounds, it could be continuity through all the ground pins that would allow power to flow.
And since the snap-in boards are all rigid you don't really need to worry about the possibility that contact will be made in like.. a rolling way. Either the pins are on the board or they're not.
But I'm not an EE, just a hobbyist, so maybe there's something I've missed there and what I'm thinking is way more complicated than I think.
Hobbyist isn't necessarily bad though. Look at where boards like the raspberry pi/Arduino were and look at where they are now. There was an image floating around a few weeks back of a major screen at a train station that had crashed... with the raspberry pi logo at the top. It will take time, sure, but it could become much bigger than one might expect.
Connector reliability and mechanical strength is a big problem here. If the baseplate had screw holes with threaded inserts, so you could screw everything down, it would hold together better. Also, the animation looks cool, but there is no power source, and no external connections.
Google tried this in 2015. It was called Project Ara.[1] A similar click-together system, with the same problems. Plus the problem that there's no good reason to make a phone that way. Google acquired that from Phonebloks and killed it.[2]
It's not a bad idea if you solve the mechanical problems and have the components produced in sufficient quantity to be very cheap. A little bigger, a lot more rugged, with a good wire management solution, and you'd have something useful.
Depending on how inexpensive these things will be, I can see myself basically putting together a few of these throughout my house, with some framing, and probably never touching them again for a year or more. However having a few kits for my kids and I to play with is more likely. In the latter case, we’ll do exactly what we did whenever playing with game cartridges: blow them off, wipe them, and try again. I think it’s part of the fun, really.
The UI of the dashboard alone would be an impressive feat for a single person.
The algorithm that chooses the most likely/useful application for infinite possible combinations of modules would be an impressive feat for a single person.
The multidisciplinary coding required to get all of these pieces to work together in a hot-swap way would be an impressive feat for a single person.
The design and implementation of a single physical connection interface that can adapt or carry all these different protocols (USB, HDMI, etc) would be an impressive feat for a single person.
Not to mention the PCB design, 3D enclosure design, machine learning proficiency, aesthetic product design chops, and on and on.
All together, this is unbelievable. This is 0.01% level stuff. Mozart, Musk, Melville. Somewhere in that neighborhood.
Hey HN, Solder_Man here. I am the guy behind Pockit. Thrilled to see this modularization effort has the support (and useful criticism) of so many deep thinkers in this thread.
First, a clarification: Since people have brought up the topic of "hard to believe one guy handled all aspects", I want to state that while this is my concept and my project (and I've devoted nearly every waking hour since 2020 to it), I'm no jack of all trades.
In the last two years, for example, I've gotten occasional but much-needed help (and knowledge) from two freelancing developers for some aspects that I don't have expertise with, including Linux intricacies, DMA-based firmware programming, UI design details, and some other subtleties. A more experienced PCB designer (colleague from past) has also helped me, particularly with the recent 6-layer PCB layouts. Plus, an assistant in the past has aided with the soldering of some tightly packed boards.
Last but not least, my SO has contributed graphics + Adobe Premiere effort for my videos; her equally important contribution was being a frequent listener, and sometimes a much-needed boundary, to my evolving thoughts through this project's journey.
As the project evolves to its next phase, I do hope to get more people into primary development of this modular ecosystem, in the form of both team members and eventually custom Block designers from the community, once I organize and release the necessary files + documentation for everyone to work with.
I'm perhaps late to the party, but I'll try to answer as many questions as I can on this thread now, including hopefully the ones posted several hours ago!
Yeah, I also thought that. Put a "pay $50 to pre-order a prototype" box somewhere. At the very least, it'll give you enough budget to negotiate on eye level with production partners.
If you need help with getting it manufactured in volume (Molds, DFM, QA, Management), I can help / put you in touch with people that make Teenage Engineering products in Malaysia.
Appreciate the disclosure of other people on it. But, to be honest, even if the 5 additional people you listed were on the project full time, I'd still be impressed. Well done.
The project has taken so much focus that I haven't had the time nor skill to heavily improve the website's CSS/aesthetics. Or if you mean just the content, any suggestions for what I could consider adding now (besides the existent timeline posts)? I'd love for the site to not feel 'empty'!
I think one approach to make the website "fuller" would be extract tiny 3-4 second gifs from the video and show them alongside text to immediately surface specific features with minimal interaction - that should be enough to whet people's appetite to make them jump to the video.
Blown away, by both the adaptiveness of the platform and software. It feels like the flexibility that I'd want for all of my prototyping experiments. Signed-up, and patiently cheering from the side-lines.
So cool. Anyone criticizing the real utility of one of these (e.g. calling it a toy) is not thinking long term. Over time a single unit could be repurposed for any number of distinct and serious usecases (home automation being the most natural fit, but many others), and this and its software are important steps toward a more robust and useful devices and less waste. Minitirized, waterproofed, secure and many more modules and "apps", standardized and mass produced. This is huge. Keep going!
The problem with this idea is that it assumes we have to make trade offs: case in point, remember pre-smartphone? I had a PDA which didn't have a camera, didn't have wifi - just a hardwired connection.
Now I have sitting next to me a smartphone which has 5 cameras, GPS, wifi, bluetooth, NFC, 128GB of storage and 4G.
Basically on a mass production scale it is always going to be cheaper just to put every feature in one device and build a billion of them.
EDIT: Which is not to say the system doesn't have some possibilities - at the right price point I'd replace every light switch in my house with a plate of this, and have them remotely control relays so I could remap everything. For task-specific physical applications you might want to remap/customize to taste, there's a lot of potential.
> Basically on a mass production scale it is always going to be cheaper just to put every feature in one device and build a billion of them.
When it comes to physical widgets, there's a limit to how many you could practically have on one device. I think the real value here is that it could be open to market to allow a real diversity of physical augments allowing people to improvise devices that are unlikely to be manufactured into a single form factor, but might be perfect for their niche use case.
Why can't the widgets connect to a Raspberry Pi using USB ports? Using plain old USB ports as a connector is a downgrade in terms of aesthetics, but it's a massive upgrade in terms of reusability and versatility. All of a sudden, you can connect your sensors to laptops, PCs and Raspberry Pis alike. You can already get a webcam on eBay for $6. You could design any sensor and actuator to have a USB interface.
Don't get me wrong, like I said, USB devices would look less cute and tidy than the Pockit, and the Pockit is a great achievement, but USB devices truly are more simple and versatile.
The aesthetics is an important factor. I'd pay far more for something like Pockit than for a bunch of components hanging off a Pi with no coherent design.
You can use a 3D printer to print a case that fits all the components and makes it look however you want. You're also not restricted to having your USB devices be right next to the Pi's board. It's just more flexible.
Another thing to consider is that the connection to the blocks on the Pockit might be fragile. If you push that button/joystick too hard or bump something, it could easily disconnect.
I could. That requires me to have a 3D printer and be willing to invest the time in figuring out how to make a case. I don't, and I'm not.
Of course it's going to be more flexible, just like it's more flexible to design your own device from scratch. But I'd trade that flexibility away for more time to do things I actually want to be doing any time, and I'd be willing to pay quite a bit of money to get that kind of flexibility without having to spend as much time on it.
I just don't think the tradeoff is worth it. The Pockit will have a relatively small community, and you may be forced to use their software packages to develop for it. It may not be very robust or very versatile. Those are all real downsides, in addition to the higher cost.
Low friction. Lowering the entry point at which someone can fashion a device to their needs means you have a much bigger market. Approachability is exactly why iPhone succeeded where stylus driven PDAs failed. Something like Pockit makes custom hardware more approachable to a wider audience. Maybe with Pockit, R-Pi might even have its iPhone-like killer app to take it from a niche/techinical crowd into regular consumers hands?
> have them remotely control relays so I could remap everything
No need for relays – you can replace the bulbs with smart lightbulbs that can be controlled via Zigbee. Ikea smart bulbs are high quality and good value.
ZigBee is good, but can grt annoying when you have a lot of them, and you have to think about how to make the mesh resilient (my house is a nightmare for signal propagation...). It takes frustratingly long for all of mine to switch off. A Lightwave bridge would be a way to solve that without relays, though. They provide what you need to turn the lights on and off, and you could use Pockit for larger control panels.
What I like about platforms like this is the possibilities they open up for major players to experiment with weird form factors again. Basically the cost of software development, mostly.
I loved some of the insane designs prior to manufacturers deciding that the iPhone form factor was the way forward.
That said, Moto/Google did try something like this once, "Project Ara" which never really went much of anywhere. It led to a few modules being released for the Moto G and that was it. (IIRC)
I kind of would like to call this a toy, but by that I mean -- wow, on top of any other application he can think of, this would be an amazing educational toy for a kid who isn't quite ready for Arduino or Raspberry Pi (or who might never be, not everybody interested in STEM wants to do circuits).
A very cool toy, a very sophisticated toy, but a toy nonetheless. There were in the past, and I think still today, electronic sets that let you click together modules with magnets to make circuits. It was a very handsy, easy way to play with electronics. But, in the end, that's what it was -- play and exploration.
The beauty of the concept is the easy interchange of the parts and such, and that's it downfall when you desire to render something down in to a "production" item. And by production, I mean something you're going to handle with any frequency. The ease of composability is counter to the hardening necessity for everyday use.
I supposed you could glue the parts together, but by that time whatever you made is now made of rather expensive components. Or they could offer an alternate mechanic to "realize" systems built for the longer term.
Until then, it's a wonderful toy. And that's not a bad thing.
To me it feels more like, being the thing for home computing/automation, that the PC was for computing in general. A PC has not a clear single purpose, but is very modular and you have to spent some time to adjust it to your use-cases.
Similarly, the pockit has not that single use-case and you have to spent some time to adjust it to your use-case. However, especially with the Pockit-to-Pockit communication you can build so many cool things.
Maybe a PC is just a toy too, but IMHO it depends on how you use it.
>And by production, I mean something you're going to handle with any frequency. The ease of composability is counter to the hardening necessity for everyday use.
Let's remind ourselves that this is a highly advanced proof-of-concept. If the issue really is simply the integrity of materials, that can be improved, and should not be considered a long-term limitation of the underlying technology: which is frankly too sophisticated from a design and software perspective to be set aside as a toy.
After all, the difference between a "Fisher-Price" drill and a "De-Walt" drill is the integrity of materials and underlying software. It is arguably a toy aesthetically, but (in accord with your argument) it is a few carbon fiber pieces away from becoming a useful generalized personal computing tool, the same way a drill is a useful generalized power tool.
Very beautiful, seems the ideal toy to teach kids how to play with technology in creative ways. It could be completed by kits with real pcbs and parts to turn the modular device into an useable functioning board. All software and firmware should also be 100% open.
Schools should seriously consider adopting it, although I fear the amount of engineering and design will probably keep the price very high.
This is really incredible. I can't wait to get my hands on the device and tinker around with it. It is giving me the same vibe as project Ara[0], and I'm here for it.
Whatever it was — a lie, the truth, or, most likely, their mixture — that caused me to make such a decision, I am immensely grateful to it for what appears to have been my first free act. It was an instinctive act, a walkout. Reason had very little to do with it. I know that, because I've been walking out ever since, with increasing frequency. And not necessarily on account of boredom or of feeling a trap gaping; I've been walking out of perfect setups no less often than out of dreadful ones. However modest the place you happen to occupy, if it has the slightest mark of decency, you can be sure that someday somebody will walk in and claim it for himself or, what is worse, suggest that you share it. Then you either have to fight for that place or leave it. I happened to prefer the latter. Not at all because I couldn't fight, but rather out of sheer disgust with myself: managing to pick something that attracts others denotes a certain vulgarity in your choice. It doesn't matter at all that you came across the place first. It is even worse to get somewhere first, for those who follow will always have a stronger appetite than your partially satisfied one.
Meanwhile I have no idea what he's talking about. Perhaps it's lack of context, or perhaps the writing is so "extraordinary" that it is unapproachable to mere mortals.
It's (at least partly) about trying something new and learning to be happy with whatever level of success you achieve rather than envious of or competitive against those who do the same thing but do it better.
In my (blunt) reading, it's an eloquent, abstract way of saying that the author was way into {thing} before it was cool, but then people found out about {thing}, at which point it was no longer hip and new, and so the author was forced to move on (in disgust!). About how it's hard to be a trendsetter, because people who follow are such tryhards!
I’ve never been accused of hipsterism and the excerpt really hits home for me. Probably for a lot of contrarian nerds, always doing things the hard way because doubt is a signalless virtue and I dunno, that other road already has people on it.
OTOH your summary was hilarious if a bit cynical, and I already like Brodsky so who knows.
There's plenty of "good writers" and "decorated poets" who do absolutely nothing for me. I clicked with this, the world is big enough for everyone and something more to your tastes is out there.
I have read a poem or two by him before, but never essays. I literally picked this book earlier this week and really liking it -- generally essays are hard for me, but he has kind of clicked for me. If anyone is interested, the excerpt is from an essay titled Less Than One, and the name of the book is also Less Than One, Selected Essays by Joseph Brodsky.
What impresses me the most is how holistic the project is, they are clearly using this device and thinking carefully about how to make it useful, and how it will be used.
This reminds me of LittleBits [1] many years ago i bought a kit from them that was really very expensive and had some fun. The only problem is i never touched them again after the first couple of weeks of playing with them. However, they're certainly an excellent learning tool for kids and beginners.
Yes, we had several kits too, including SynthKit (LittleBits with Korg). The magnetic connectors of LittleBits became unreliable after a while, making it frustrating instead of enjoyable. Wish one could fix that properly.
That's the problem with this kind of things. They mostly attract people interested in tech, but those kind of people are usuallt already working in tech. As much as I love those things, the last thing I want when I lock my laptop is start coding and fiddling with electronic devices. I either have to take care of the kids or go for a bicycle ride, spend time with my partner, have a beer or the sea/beach or all of the above and in no particular order. I need so much to be outdoor when I finish my work day I barely find time to make music although I love doing that.
The people who could do that are the people who have time to spend hours watching Netflix series but usually they are the lazy type and not interested in that kind of things.
Unless it is used by a school most of those things end up in drawer not to be used again.
It reminds me of Star Trek's Isolinear chips that you would see Crew members slotting or re-ordering to create different effects, or create an ionic pulse from the deflector shield.
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[ 5.4 ms ] story [ 237 ms ] threadWouldn't a desktop with 100 USB ports be a modular computer in the same sense as this thing?
At least USB has and will be supported for years. The next revision will likely be incompatible with this limited cross connector (which I admit is cool nonetheless).
If you need the modularity and power of a desktop computer so you can install a boat-load of RAM or upgrade the video card, get a desktop computer.
But I like the concept for areas such as schools etc., because it makes it possible to try a bunch of different things very fast.
In terms of "serious use" I think that depends on what you mean by "serious". E.g. my hone automation setup is not static, because I keep finding new little things I want to tweak, and often the ready-made solution lack options I'd like to have unless I'm willing to spend time tracking down very specific modules. My time is valuable to me - I'd happily pay extra for a modular system where I know if something is lacking a button for something I want I can literally just plug one in instead of having to search all over for a different model of something.
Of course this will not replace mass market "close enough" solutions.
But I think there are still more than enough people who want to tinker but don't want to have to whip out a soldering iron.
Things like a single dimmer etc. is not the problem, because for simple stuff like that there are plenty of off the shelf options.
The issue is anything that deviates from what manufacturers expect. And yes, I'd be happy to use a lot like that for that even at a quite high cost because the existing options to do it cleanly without a self build are also expensive.
But I am not sure about the rest.
And what you don't see in demos like this are the practical limitations that the demo avoids. I didn't watch all the way to the end but I had questions about how the device communicates its limitations and handles situations where, for example, it cannot supply enough power.
EDIT: Though that does make a key weakness the fact that there doesn't appear to be any provisioning for locking down the blocks more aggressively to the board.
I'm betting that it will be cost-prohibitive to have this device as a permanent fixture for any one application outside outside of the sorts of things an rPi4 already does (Home Assistant server, etc). I don't think anyone is going to use it to control an LED with a slider, but for prototyping that sort of thing it has endless possibilities.
Hats off to Anil for the huge amount of work he put into this project.
Because of what's happening with climate, pollution and e-waste, the future is modular. Modular phones, computers, cars and even nuclear reactors.
Having this kind of thing in schools helps kids get used to the idea that technology is configurable at the physical level without electronics skills.
Strong interoperability legislation should be a part of technology going forward. Industry will welcome and adapt to it because it's ultimately a better compromise than tougher regulation and export controls.
Sounds cool, but the reality is that in order to get the best efficiency, you often want a purpose-built, specialized design. In the case of electric cars, you need your car to be very light and to have a very integrated design in order to maximize energy efficiency. I'm not sure what you mean by a modular car design, but you definitely can't fit any motors with any battery in any frame, that will just make for a car with terrible performance.
That being said, we should be designing things to maximize lifetime, and we should probably ban certain materials or construction techniques that make recycling difficult. Maybe we need to ban or heavily tax non-recyclable materials. We could also do more to build a legal framework around right to repair.
> Having this kind of thing in schools helps kids get used to the idea that technology is configurable at the physical level without electronics skills.
Kids is probably the best use case. As someone who makes things I look at this product and I think it's necessarily going to be more expensive and less flexible compared to alternatives. For kids though, this can be a gateway to make electronics less scary.
> Strong interoperability legislation should be a part of technology going forward. Industry will welcome and adapt to it because it's ultimately a better compromise than tougher regulation and export controls.
I agree. We should be strongly promoting (and maybe legally mandating) open, documented standards for everything.
What are the alternatives? Is there something like this I can get my hands on now?
Not any in any, but some in some is already possible, some Renault cars share parts for example with Dacia. But other companies tweak their design each yer, they change how the head lights look, shapes change, then some other inside parts shape needs to change so you got people having to redesign, re-test each year new filters and piping/hosing (this is the ones I am familiar with), Other shitty thing that happens is patents, some company gets a patent for some pretty obvious thing, now if you want to make spare parts for those cars you need to work around dose patents - a lot of work and expenses to be able to offer a different choice to the consumer.
The reason the engines and other parts can't be share is design and recently DRM, for sure you won't be able to install unofficial wheels on your fancy car without breaking some DRM protection(but is for your safety /s).
>we should be designing things to maximize lifetime
The duality between these two competing (and defensible) positions is the crux, isn't it?
Really, truly blown away. I'm sure there are plenty of edge cases to correct for but I haven't gotten so excited by a demo in a long time. I've obviously signed up to learn more.
However, the most complex and costly part is the PCB and circuit design. The PCBs used in the blocks are absolutely awesome.
Thanks to 3D printers that are cheap, the casing and other plastic materials are easy to make.
All that being said, this has very low chance of becoming a real world product. Real world is messy, dirty, wet and an absolutely shitty place for snap on electronics.
What would work, is better connector technology. It is obvious that even with all this simplification, this will still be a hobbyist product, rather than a serious mass market product.
> Merveilles seems aligned with the ideals of Solarpunk while internally expecting the world of Cyberpunk, it is neither a utopian or dystopian vision, but a way of straddling both contingencies.
https://wiki.xxiivv.com/site/merveilles.html
Two things stick out for critique to me -
> Merveilles seems aligned with the ideals of Solarpunk while internally expecting the world of Cyberpunk, it is neither a utopian or dystopian vision, but a way of straddling both contingencies.
I get this, and in a way, I think it’s how I’m operating already, but man, it’s an art movement - don’t give the dystopia space in the room, it’s already got plenty everywhere else.
> The Merveilles visual aesthetic restricts color palettes to black and white, vector or pixel art, with at most a single accent color (usually a sea-foam aqua). Industrial design is minimalist, geometric black-forged metals, natural wood.
My visual aesthetic these days is “all of the above.” For the love of god, colors exist - trillions of them! Take two! Hell, take three or four! They’re cheap! And shapes - my god, man, the shapes you can make! You ever see the temple carvings in Nepal? So many shapes! Take a walk through a forest, and just look at all the shapes! Look at trees, man - the opposite of simple!
(this was intended as a gentle ribbing, not actual criticism. I found the contrast between exclusion and inclusion interesting :)
https://www.fsf.org/news/artist-collective-hundred-rabbits-t...
[0] https://git.sr.ht/~rabbits/adelie
So likely they won't have nearly the cycle life of USB-C but do they really need to?
Most user-facing connectors have a metal shield around them connected to frame ground. The idea is that any ESD shock goes safely through this first instead of to a sensitive data line.
Connection-sequencing ensures that the ground and power is connected before data lines are. If you look inside a cable-side USB connector, you'll see that the inner two wires (data) are recessed a little so that the power connectors go first. A device that is connected without power can (through its ESD protection circuit) attempt to draw power from data lines... this can cause damage because most data lines can't supply the current to power the entire device.
Every USB device connected to your PC right now probably has a little ESD protection IC in it. Usually sitting right next to the USB connector (as close as possible).
And since the snap-in boards are all rigid you don't really need to worry about the possibility that contact will be made in like.. a rolling way. Either the pins are on the board or they're not.
But I'm not an EE, just a hobbyist, so maybe there's something I've missed there and what I'm thinking is way more complicated than I think.
Google tried this in 2015. It was called Project Ara.[1] A similar click-together system, with the same problems. Plus the problem that there's no good reason to make a phone that way. Google acquired that from Phonebloks and killed it.[2]
It's not a bad idea if you solve the mechanical problems and have the components produced in sufficient quantity to be very cheap. A little bigger, a lot more rugged, with a good wire management solution, and you'd have something useful.
[1] https://www.cnet.com/tech/mobile/project-ara-everything-we-k...
[2] https://www.onearmy.earth/project/phonebloks
It is briefly explained at 4:04 that the initial 4 mins it's running on a 3300 battery, and then he swaps it to USB charging.
The algorithm that chooses the most likely/useful application for infinite possible combinations of modules would be an impressive feat for a single person.
The multidisciplinary coding required to get all of these pieces to work together in a hot-swap way would be an impressive feat for a single person.
The design and implementation of a single physical connection interface that can adapt or carry all these different protocols (USB, HDMI, etc) would be an impressive feat for a single person.
Not to mention the PCB design, 3D enclosure design, machine learning proficiency, aesthetic product design chops, and on and on.
All together, this is unbelievable. This is 0.01% level stuff. Mozart, Musk, Melville. Somewhere in that neighborhood.
As solo founder this is really motivational - I hope my upcoming project garners even half the interest once launched! So many hats.
First, a clarification: Since people have brought up the topic of "hard to believe one guy handled all aspects", I want to state that while this is my concept and my project (and I've devoted nearly every waking hour since 2020 to it), I'm no jack of all trades.
In the last two years, for example, I've gotten occasional but much-needed help (and knowledge) from two freelancing developers for some aspects that I don't have expertise with, including Linux intricacies, DMA-based firmware programming, UI design details, and some other subtleties. A more experienced PCB designer (colleague from past) has also helped me, particularly with the recent 6-layer PCB layouts. Plus, an assistant in the past has aided with the soldering of some tightly packed boards.
Last but not least, my SO has contributed graphics + Adobe Premiere effort for my videos; her equally important contribution was being a frequent listener, and sometimes a much-needed boundary, to my evolving thoughts through this project's journey.
As the project evolves to its next phase, I do hope to get more people into primary development of this modular ecosystem, in the form of both team members and eventually custom Block designers from the community, once I organize and release the necessary files + documentation for everyone to work with.
I'm perhaps late to the party, but I'll try to answer as many questions as I can on this thread now, including hopefully the ones posted several hours ago!
How are you planning to commercialise this?
Awesome and Inspiring work!
Contact in the HN profile.
With this video my jaw kept dropping every couple of minutes.
Now I have sitting next to me a smartphone which has 5 cameras, GPS, wifi, bluetooth, NFC, 128GB of storage and 4G.
Basically on a mass production scale it is always going to be cheaper just to put every feature in one device and build a billion of them.
EDIT: Which is not to say the system doesn't have some possibilities - at the right price point I'd replace every light switch in my house with a plate of this, and have them remotely control relays so I could remap everything. For task-specific physical applications you might want to remap/customize to taste, there's a lot of potential.
When it comes to physical widgets, there's a limit to how many you could practically have on one device. I think the real value here is that it could be open to market to allow a real diversity of physical augments allowing people to improvise devices that are unlikely to be manufactured into a single form factor, but might be perfect for their niche use case.
Don't get me wrong, like I said, USB devices would look less cute and tidy than the Pockit, and the Pockit is a great achievement, but USB devices truly are more simple and versatile.
Another thing to consider is that the connection to the blocks on the Pockit might be fragile. If you push that button/joystick too hard or bump something, it could easily disconnect.
Of course it's going to be more flexible, just like it's more flexible to design your own device from scratch. But I'd trade that flexibility away for more time to do things I actually want to be doing any time, and I'd be willing to pay quite a bit of money to get that kind of flexibility without having to spend as much time on it.
No need for relays – you can replace the bulbs with smart lightbulbs that can be controlled via Zigbee. Ikea smart bulbs are high quality and good value.
I loved some of the insane designs prior to manufacturers deciding that the iPhone form factor was the way forward.
That said, Moto/Google did try something like this once, "Project Ara" which never really went much of anywhere. It led to a few modules being released for the Moto G and that was it. (IIRC)
(This message brought to you by the society for people tired of Jony-Ive-esque bullshit being passed off as the One True Design Paradigm.)
A very cool toy, a very sophisticated toy, but a toy nonetheless. There were in the past, and I think still today, electronic sets that let you click together modules with magnets to make circuits. It was a very handsy, easy way to play with electronics. But, in the end, that's what it was -- play and exploration.
The beauty of the concept is the easy interchange of the parts and such, and that's it downfall when you desire to render something down in to a "production" item. And by production, I mean something you're going to handle with any frequency. The ease of composability is counter to the hardening necessity for everyday use.
I supposed you could glue the parts together, but by that time whatever you made is now made of rather expensive components. Or they could offer an alternate mechanic to "realize" systems built for the longer term.
Until then, it's a wonderful toy. And that's not a bad thing.
Similarly, the pockit has not that single use-case and you have to spent some time to adjust it to your use-case. However, especially with the Pockit-to-Pockit communication you can build so many cool things.
Maybe a PC is just a toy too, but IMHO it depends on how you use it.
Let's remind ourselves that this is a highly advanced proof-of-concept. If the issue really is simply the integrity of materials, that can be improved, and should not be considered a long-term limitation of the underlying technology: which is frankly too sophisticated from a design and software perspective to be set aside as a toy.
After all, the difference between a "Fisher-Price" drill and a "De-Walt" drill is the integrity of materials and underlying software. It is arguably a toy aesthetically, but (in accord with your argument) it is a few carbon fiber pieces away from becoming a useful generalized personal computing tool, the same way a drill is a useful generalized power tool.
https://old.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/ta85ql/my_small_modu...
Shorter demo (7:30) submitted to Reddit:
https://v.redd.it/3wfbkleb4dm81
https://www.reddit.com/r/arduino/comments/dj7ilc/so_ive_been...
all posts about this project (around 30):
https://www.reddit.com/user/Solder_Man/posts/
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Ara
What a wild achievement. Well done.
- Joseph Brodsky
At least, that's the way I took it.
In other words, it's Hipsterism in fancy prose.
> managing to pick something that attracts others denotes a certain vulgarity in your choice
OTOH your summary was hilarious if a bit cynical, and I already like Brodsky so who knows.
My reaction was: "Ok, that's cool, but he can not have X module" a minute later "X" appears, and it went throughout the video.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LittleBits
The people who could do that are the people who have time to spend hours watching Netflix series but usually they are the lazy type and not interested in that kind of things.
Unless it is used by a school most of those things end up in drawer not to be used again.
It reminds me of Star Trek's Isolinear chips that you would see Crew members slotting or re-ordering to create different effects, or create an ionic pulse from the deflector shield.
https://youtu.be/rr8eO6gfnuY?t=66
Some follow up:
Typical, fairly sensationalist piece on Google's Project Ara - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQqudiUdGuo
and then, Phonebloks, 5 years later - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wwrIpv38nE
Something about this just seems fresh and fun again.
Tech is still fun. It might just be that you're getting older.
Arduino and the like are probably the least commercialised and they are ok. But everyone grows out of them.