Trackpoint's "Science Exploration Wand" ?

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jhonyl · #1 Post by **jhonyl** » Tue Jun 07, 2005 8:46 am

Hi,

I have seen this "Science Exploration Wand" at http://www.almaden.ibm.com/cs/user/tp/science.html and I wonder about it. If you know more info about it, specs of the measurment it can do, and please tell me where I could get it.

Thanks

PS. I also seen something about negative inertia at http://www.almaden.ibm.com/cs/user/tp/ninertia.html but I don't think my trackpoint bounce of the screen side. Where could I get it?

bhtooefr · #2 Post by **bhtooefr** » Tue Jun 07, 2005 11:09 am

With a ThinkPad 755, of course

Most likely, it's a feature of the TrackPoint III that confused people (because of the bounce-back thing). They most likely did one of two things:

Removed negative inertia in hardware from the TrackPoint IV (the current TrackPoint - identifiable by the scroll button between mouse buttons, AFAICT)

Disabled it in software

If it's removed from the hardware, forget about using it. However, if it's disabled in software, I know that there ARE TrackPoint drivers, and if they have any configuration options, USE THEM!

jhonyl · #3 Post by **jhonyl** » Tue Jun 07, 2005 11:43 am

Hi again,

I found out how to bounce the mouse off the edge of the screen, and why it didn't bounce before. When I moved it to the right edge, I kept holding it to the right and so it couldn't bounce. Now I tried to leave the trackpoint stick just as it meet the edge, and then it bounced 1/8th of the screen to the left. I even turned on the mouse trail to see that I don't stop it before it gets to the edge and then think that it was thrown left. I think that I will keep the trail on, since it help me see where the cursor is, being a trackpoint newbie.

BTW About the "Science Exploration Wand" - If you don't know about it, maybe you would know how to extract raw movement data from the trackpoint stick? That could help too.

jhonyl · #4 Post by **jhonyl** » Tue Jun 07, 2005 4:43 pm

I have found this page:
http://www.almaden.ibm.com/cs/new_parad ... cienc.html
which has the software, but apparently it is designed for MS-DOS and doesn't work well for me, at least on the first attempt.

bhtooefr · #5 Post by **bhtooefr** » Tue Jun 07, 2005 4:53 pm

E-mail this address (hopefully they still check it...):
npuc95@almaden.ibm.com

The badges from the 4th annual NPUC workshop, according to this site, are the rest of the science lab kit. So, you'll need one

Now, if you have trouble running a DOS app, put (PC or MS-)DOS on a floppy, and boot off of that. Of course, you've got a T42, so you may have to burn this to a CD. I forget how to do that right now (anyone done this recently?), but basically, it looks (to DOS) like a 650-700MB floppy - even has a floppy boot sector. I think it's something in Nero like "CD Floppy Emulation" or something like that...

EDIT: It's a 16-bit Windows app. It DOES run on XP, but complains left and right about it (because it wants to run in Standard mode for some reason, and the NTVDM runs in 386 Enhanced mode). I couldn't test this at all, b/c I'm on a Dell with a touchpad...

jhonyl · #6 Post by **jhonyl** » Wed Jun 08, 2005 4:55 am

The program runs, but in the beginning it states that windows is running in "Enhanced Mode" and asked me to run windows in "Standard Mode" by running "win/s" which does nothing for me (In windows XP). Then comes a screen that has a big place for the graph to be drawn and some control options on the sides, but when I moved the trackpoint it just brought the mouse cursor back, and no graph was drawn. It also was not responsive to any mouse press or key click, and I had to shut it down via the task manager. I figured that maybe "Standard Mode " is "safe mode" and tried it, but that wasn't it either. I guess that MS-DOS is the next option, but do I need a driver for MS-DOS?

About that e-mail, I tried to email
npuc95@almaden.ibm.com and that is the reply that I have got:
-----------------------------------------------
Your message

Subject: "Science Exploration Wand"

was not delivered to:

npuc@us.ibm.com

because:

User npuc (npuc@us.ibm.com) not listed in Domino Directory
-----------------------------------------------------------

bhtooefr · #7 Post by **bhtooefr** » Wed Jun 08, 2005 7:11 am

Standard mode means that you HAVE to use Windows 3.1.

A Windows 3.1 Live CD MIGHT be doable, but not easy.

Do you have a FAT partition on your hard drive? You could put Windows 3.1 on there...

Also, try npuc@almaden.ibm.com. It probably won't work, but it's the address for NPUC2004...

jhonyl · #8 Post by **jhonyl** » Wed Jun 08, 2005 8:00 am

I found out that my ThinkPad has a tri-axial accelerometer as part of its hard drive shock protection system. Does anyone knows how to read its raw data output? Does anyone know the physical specification of that accelerometer?

rideDPU · #9 Post by **rideDPU** » Wed Jun 08, 2005 9:37 am

jhonyl,
I'm sorry I can't help you directly, but I do know that when Apple started putting the same (or similar) system in their Powerbooks a few months ago, there were various people who were able to use it for rudimentary games and such. You may google along those lines for information...

Mark

roast · #10 Post by **roast** » Wed Jun 08, 2005 11:44 am

rideDPU wrote: I'm sorry I can't help you directly, but I do know that when Apple started putting the same (or similar) system in their Powerbooks a few months ago, there were various people who were able to use it for rudimentary games and such. You may google along those lines for information...

The system is called ams for "apple motion sensor". See http://www.kernelthread.com/software/ams/.

dmdsoftware · #11 Post by **dmdsoftware** » Thu Jun 09, 2005 5:14 pm

bhtooefr wrote:Standard mode means that you HAVE to use Windows 3.1.

A Windows 3.1 Live CD MIGHT be doable, but not easy.

Do you have a FAT partition on your hard drive? You could put Windows 3.1 on there...

Also, try npuc@almaden.ibm.com. It probably won't work, but it's the address for NPUC2004...

Use VMware to boot a Win 3.1 image. Easy and fast solution.

bhtooefr · #12 Post by **bhtooefr** » Thu Jun 09, 2005 5:38 pm

I thought of that, but if the program needs to get raw data from the TrackPoint, then it simply won't work.

VMWare/Virtual PC use the mouse pointer to simulate a PS/2 mouse for the OS. Obviously, that approach can't possibly work if the science app has to read directly from the TrackPoint!

Trackpoint's "Science Exploration Wand" ?

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