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Oldies but Goodies
ANABIC
Cypher
Bored during a first-year college class,
I started scribbling some notes using a
combination of letter substitution, unique
graphemes, and phonemes. The result was a
written language I called "Anabic".
Because it was designed for quick encoding, I
ended up filling several notebooks with
everything from daily journal notes and poems to conceptual thoughts
and daydreams.
Today I can still read most of the
notes in "real time", though it takes some effort.
Page from a collection of
poems written in Anabic
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IRIS 16
SBC
Since my earliest days writing code for
microprocessors, I developed a preference for the
Motorola family of devices. So when their 68000
processor became available in 1980, I wanted to
be first in line to design a single board
computer using their new 16/32 bit device.
I eventually designed two versions of the
"IRIS" computer, both using the 68000 but with
different amounts of RAM and I/O peripherals.
Version 2 was quite fast for the time, executing
an Eratosthenes Sieve to extract the first
5000 primes in just seconds.
Processor and DRAM
controller section of IRIS-16 V2
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Ternary
Logic TLU
The "holy grail" in computer science is
the refinement of artificial intelligence (AI).
Sadly, developments in machine
intelligence have mostly been very modest, and
primarily limited to software techniques.
After reading about perceptrons (weighted-vector neural networks)
in the late 70's, I drafted a
theory combining a hardware neuron simulacrum (the TLU
or Threshold Logic Unit) with work on ternary
logic I had done earlier. Time constraints
prevented me from building a prototype,
but I did run software simulations with
promising results.
Flow diagram for a Ternary TLU Network
Simulation
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SAGE Home Control System
In 1985, I developed a microprocessor controller under contract
for an industrial instrument manufacturer. I had
recently moved into a new home and decided that
a derivative of this design, with greatly
expanded I/O capacity, would be ideal as the
foundation for a centralized Home Automation system
(HA).
At the time, HA was an emerging concept and I
felt that building and installing a custom
system in my house would be a good weekend
project (though it quickly extended over MANY weekends).
Designated "SAGE" (a pet name I've used for
various other projects), I designed a single
board computer (SBC) based on the Hitachi HD6303
processor and added a large number of peripheral
devices to monitor and control a variety of
functions.
Ultimately, the SAGE HA project took about 2
years to install, largely due to an evolving
software platform and a huge amount of
hard-wiring throughout the house (wireless was
not an option at the time). Features, all of
which are centrally controlled, include:
• Passive IR
sensors in all living spaces to detect
occupied rooms
• Fully automatic control of all lighting in
the house based on movement
• Multiple-zone, "learning" security system
based on occupant's lifestyle
• Programmable wake-up alarms,
alerts, and environmental lighting
• Programmable mulitple-zone irrigation
systems with rain sensors
• Voice synthesized status messaging through a whole house intercom
• 24-hour temperature monitors (inside &
outside) with 5 year archives
• 24-hour monitoring of electricity usage
and HVAC efficiency
• Video (CCTV) linked to touchscreen LCDs and TVs in the house
• Built-in digital seismograph, rain guage, and water leak sensors
• Wireless LAN and web access to SAGE system status and CCTV
• Dual fault-tolerant hardware,
fully solid state core controller (no HDs)
• Core software is 100% assembly code for speed and efficiency
• Triple redundant power supply with
UPS, on-board lithium batteries
The SAGE core has been running continuously for 25 years (as of 2010) and experienced only a
single minor component failure (a video
processor chip) in all that time. Due to the
failsafe design of the hardware and software,
the system has never crashed nor been offline.
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One of the SAGE access stations with the
control panel (top) above a touchscreen LCD
showing floorplan, CCTVs, and other daily info.
Occupied rooms
and active lighting are
continuously monitored and controlled.
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Remote access to lighting control
on a network connected tablet
Energy usage summary via
integrated TED power monitor
Indoor/Outdoor temperature
graphs - weekly and annual
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