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I think you could design a device that optimizes for longevity. Build the cheapest, simplest device that can run your piece of software, and then produce lots o
by ifyoubuildit 4y ago
I think you could design a device that optimizes for longevity. Build the cheapest, simplest device that can run your piece of software, and then produce lots of them.
On the simplicity side, all of the parts would be solid state, it would handle whatever power you have on hand, the inputs and outputs would allow for using whatever devices you could cobble together in a post apocalyptic world.
Then on the software side, every one of these devices could easily export a standard image that could be used to build another device.
A lot of handwaving here, but most of what we sell these days is basically disposable because that's what is incentivized. If we actually optimized for longevity, we could probably do some amazing things.
Edit: for bonus points, each device will include detailed technical documentation on how to produce the device itself from scratch. It could be a sort of rosetta computer.
- NegativeLatency 4y agoSo a 6502(C)?
- AstralStorm 4y agoDon't forget the BASIC interpreter. The problem is that making any computer smaller than a big cabinet requires large scale integration microchips, notoriously hard to make, and potentially replace. So it's going to be closer to PDP-7. You can do quite a lot with this sort of machine in an industrial setting.
- ifyoubuildit 4y agoWhat's the life expectancy of an integrated circuit? I was thinking make tons of them and the odds are that some percentage of them would still be functional long into the future, assuming you package them up nicely.
- int_19h 4y agoOP is suggesting premaking such devices in large enough quantities that you'd just rely on them for the foreseeable future to run that legacy code.