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March 04, 2005
Sudden Motion Sensor
In the latest PowerBooks, Apple has added a sudden motion sensor. The idea is if the machine senses that it is falling or moving erratically, it will park the heads of the hard disks so as to prevent damage to your data.
Well, Amit Singh over at Kernel Thread, has taken a long hard look at the software that runs this sensor and has come up with some interesting proof of concept programs to use this information. One of the programs creates a "stable" window that stays aligned properly when you rock your PowerBook back and forth.
He admits that these concepts are just teaching tools, but does posit one very interesting idea for actual use: map the movements to keyboard keys, like the right and left keys. Using something like this, you should be able to rock your laptop and scroll web pages or large images or Google Maps.
Almost makes me want to go get a new PowerBook so I can play with it.
Posted by Samer at March 4, 2005 02:18 PM