The Brick hardware platform is back tentatively.

[Glenn Alexander]

Hi Slaters, 
 
After much thought on the nature of hardware abstraction, my little 
hardware project for a simple system to run a slate engine on has 
changed in all but the webpage graphics. 
 
I have actually found a chip that does 90 to 99.9% of what I need and 
even in a quad-flat-pack IC package (ie, I can design and assemble it 
on my own without an electronics frabrication facility -- though 3 
months ago I moved to Qingdao, which is the electronics fabrication 
capital of east China, so possibly no biggie if I do want to run off a 
few hundred ;-) so this should be doable by a humble hardware tech. 
like myself. Possibly even on a 2-sided board if I resort to wire 
links occasionally. I'm trying to get a datasheet from the 
manufacturer now. 
 
My new university is in the process of transfering campuses across a 
province. The EE dept arrives next term (out my window I see they are 
just putting the 5th floor on the EE building now) so there are 
possibilities for prototyping help there too. 
 
The very preliminary and tentative version of what passes for a spec 
is here: 
 
http://www.shoalhaven.net.au/~glenalec/brick/index.html 
 
ready for suggestions/shredding/accusations-of-idiocy from interested 
people. 
 
Regards, Glenn Alexander 
 
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Glenn Alexander 
(B.Teach, B.Ed Major IT Education, University of Wollongong Australia) 
http://www.shoalhaven.net.au/~glenalec 
 
I use GNU/Linux: http://www.gnu.org / http://www.linux.org 
from Debian: http://www.debian.org 
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(Swishes cape and prepares to fly off) My work here is dumb. 
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