wiSticky

The wiSticky is the size of a credit card and about three times as thick. Thickness comes from layering an e-ink display with battery, circuit board and a refrigerator magnet used to stick the board where it will be seen.

Chris Mason's new computer features low-power bluetooth connectivity with a nearby computer.

We're suggesting a wall-powered internet-connected computer should host federated wiki and talk bluetooth to all of the nearby wiStickies.

Imagine the wiSticky in a system for which two interfaces have been provided. One interface provides ambient information through casual observation of one or more devices. The second interface allows configuration of the devices through an embedded federated wiki server.

The ambient system consists of software running on the device and in the server-side plugins on wiki. This system is optimized for low-power through efficient use of the radio channel and display rewrite.

The federated system consists of client and server-side plugins that design, test, deploy and distribute using the node/wiki machinery.

Each wiSticky in the ambient system has a corresponding page in the federated system. A plugin on each page simulates the display on the associated wiSticky. Editing a plugin exposes the specialized markup that generates that display.

The markup retrieves information made available by adjacent wiki pages and renders it in a region of the display. Our examples presume there is bus information on a nearby page.

The display is divided into nine numbered regions organized like a tic-tac-toe board. Adjacent digits refer to adjacent regions to be render together for information that is to be made large.

Say when, where, and what to display in single lines of markup. By convention markup keywords are all-caps.

This titles the display (once) with a message that spans the top three display regions. A stroke separates this compound region from the rest of the display

This updates (repeatedly) the estimated time to arrival of the next bus in a large square composed of four display regions in the lower right-hand corner.

This polls the National Weather Service and (on change) updates the current and forecasted weather using the remaining available screen space. The built-in WEATHER keyword formulates a query, interprets the result and then transmits a graphic symbols to the device.

Scheduling draws on conventions from txtzyme. See About Txtzyme Plugin.

Variable access draws on conventions from methods. See About Method Plugin.

Server-side markup draws on experience from reports. See About Report Plugin.

The markup is interpreted and display rendered within the browser allowing immediate feedback on the desirability of any change. These changes can be reused by anyone in the federation for their own wiSticky.

Markup modifications are simultaneously sent to the ambient wiki server where they are again interpreted and communicated to the wiSticky on the next radio cycle. Future update cycles proceed without further intervention from the browser.