Newbie question

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Josh2 Lists writes:
 > Hi.
 > I just have to ask.....
 > 
 > ># ttyR6 = servo controller
 > ># ttyR7 = Bottle Rocket
 > 
 > What are these two? What does the servo do

It controls multiple hobby R/C servomotors.  Just send a packet of
three characters consisting of "beginning of packet", "servo number",
and "position".  I have two of them connected at right-angles.  I also 
have a modified xeyes program which spits out a pair of those packets
depending on the x,y position of the cursor.  I redirect the output to 
/dev/ttyR6, and the top servo motor arm points at the cursor.

It's completely useless except that it makes me happy.

 > and what on earth is a 
 > Bottle Rocket???!

It drives the X-10.com Firecracker product.  That's a 2.4Ghz
transmitter driven from an RS-232 port.  There's an X-10
receiver-cum-appliance-module as well.  Bottle Rocket is the Linux
software that drives it.  Could be very useful for dropping power on a
modem -- another reason to use external modems.  One Firecracker can
control any House/Module code -- that's over 200 devices.

They're selling them for $5.90 for a limited time.  Should be under
http://www.x10.com somewhere.  Try looking at the following freshmeat
article: http://freshmeat.net/news/1999/07/10/931665599.html .

-- 
-russ nelson <rn-sig@crynwr.com>  http://crynwr.com/~nelson
Crynwr sells support for free software  | PGPok | Government schools are so
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