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Comment by duskwuff | Hacker News Reader

In case it wasn't clear to anyone: this is a product very early in the planning phase, to the extent that many of the features are unspecified (no processor has been chosen, they aren't even certain on whether it'll be RISC-V or ARM), underspecified to the point of being unintelligible ("detachable USB gender-changer dongle"), or outright ridiculous (SSH-based communications between the keyboard and CPU).

I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for a product here. This does not have the smell of success on it.

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Yes. While it sounds impressive, it seems more like a fantasy jumble of every desirable feature they can think of than an actual plan.

"Keyboard is QUERTY". How do you misspell "QWERTY"? Yet I'm hoping they did.

They seem to be hoping for a Pixel Qi style screen (but self-developed?), but describe its reflective mode as: "A non-reflective - a button driven backlight “off” monochrome mode for very low-power use in sunlight"

Confusion between trackpoint and trackball: "track-point ball"

Perhaps it’s just an English as a second language thing? Note, I have no idea the background of who is behind the project..

There's gotta be some reasoning behind those but when you put it that way it sounds like some hilarious marketing speak.

"We're putting blockchain technology in the trackpad"

"Machine learning in the power button"

This may sound insane, but machine learning in the power button may be a thing already. Fingerprinter readers (often built into the power button) have moved from “match on host” to “match on chip”, and it’s possible some of them use ML-based matching.

indeed, I believe the M1 mac power button is also the fingerprint sensor...

My 2019 MacBook Pro uses the power button for the fingerprint sensor. Apple has been doing that for a while, since the iPhone 6s as I recall.

"We used a malleable logarithmic casing to construct the chassis of the laptop"

Looks like the good ol' "Have you tried logarithms? " worked for them.

https://xkcd.com/451/

Note, the grandparent is not actually quoting the website, they are referencing the fictional Turboencabulator[1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turboencabulator

"Includes a laptop bag made with Fine Corinthian Leather"

(due to supply constraints, laptop bag will be made with Nylon.)

For anyone else who wants to take a peek for themselves at the concerns raised in this comment: https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:https:...

Another thing that doesn't seem to line up with reality is the idea that they might convince Nvidia to make their stuff FOSS enough to be included in this project.

Like seriously what would an ssh client running on the keyboard even achieve? Maybe they’re thinking of encrypting it. But keyloggers running at the OS level don’t care. Or is this to force people to only use their keyboards? Or maybe it’ll just add a billion to their SPAC buyout.

I guess you could have a wireless keyboard without some of the bluetooth security issues?

SSH would not be the way to accomplish that.

What, exactly, is unintelligible about a "detachable USB gender-changer dongle"? A gender-changing adapter is one that has either a male connector at both ends or a female connector at both ends. They're used in damned near anything involving plugs and cables - or hoses, for that matter. It's not a mystery marketing term or anything. In this case, it would be female at both ends, providing a degree of physical security when not in place (as both the USB device to be plugged in and the dongle-less computer would have male connectors), and, as described, would also act as a security dongle when attached (the USB port needs to see the dongle and have it password-activated in order to use the USB port, so a simple passthru gender-changer won't give access).

My favorite is the GPU paragraph:

> While NVIDIA would be technically possibly the best performance choice, issues arise with general attitude towards FOSS compatibilty. In any case we look and listen into NVIDIA and CUDA options, accelerating totally open documentation from NVIDIA's side. Also the NVIDIA's Jetson IoT and AI platform is researched for a compatibility with RISC-V architecture, ISA and FOSS

Uh, surely they don't mean the retro ISA bus, right? :D

On a more serious note if I could build a big (dGPU oriented) open laptop I would put an MXM slot in there, so that existing Radeon cards could be used.

ISA == Intruction Set Architecture.

Of course, but the way they use it makes no sense.

There's another level of WTF in that paragraph. "NVIDIA Jetson" is a marketing name used for a series of Tegra development boards. Tegra is an ARM SoC in and of itself. It isn't a discrete graphics solution.

I assumed that when I read the words riscv and laptop, but then I saw nlnet was backing the project. I wonder what they are hoping to get out of the project.

> While being versatile and robust it also follows CERN OSHL, GNU-GPL, FOSS, EOMA, ISA and even CC guidelines

This is almost the most concerning part. They're treating FOSS like it's some kind of standard. It's not. FOSS just means software that is free and open source. Something is, or isn't FOSS. You don't follow some standard to deliver a FOSS product. I also couldn't find a single reference to CERN OSHL anywhere online other than on their website. The closest thing I could find was Out-of-school-hours learning... again, if that's what they meant this is doomed.

I think by "CERN OSHL" they mean the CERN Open Hardware License: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CERN_Open_Hardware_License

There's no "Source" in the name.

the acronym salad seems to support it being vapourware, but I think CERN OSHL is a typo for a real thing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CERN_Open_Hardware_Licence

Any fan of '90s JRPG's will tell you this product shares its name with an engineer who finished his masterpiece in the year 2300.

The irony is strong.

Yeah - clicked on this expecting to see vaporware; was not disappointed.

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