Message from discussion
A Coke machine on the internet???
Path: gmd.de!newsserver.jvnc.net!howland.reston.ans.net!usc!rpi!batcomputer!munnari.oz.au!uniwa!john
From: j...@gu.uwa.edu.au (John West)
Newsgroups: alt.hackers
Subject: Re: A Coke machine on the internet???
Date: 10 Apr 1993 13:17:27 GMT
Organization: The University of Western Australia
Lines: 65
Approved: The Big Pink Fish in the Sky
Message-ID: <1q6hd7$gd1@uniwa.uwa.oz.au>
References: <linleyC57JqD.C2t@netcom.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: mackerel.gu.uwa.edu.au
lin...@netcom.com (Bruce James Robrert Linley) writes:
>Some time ago, I remember reading about a coke machine on the internet. You
>could 'finger' it to check it's inventory. Does anyone have it's address?
>Thanks.
The best known is at CMU (try finger c...@cmu.edu). This is apparently
their second machine, after the first died a some years ago. I've also
heard that MIT had one, but couldn't find any confirmation beyond two
machines called coke and pepsi. They were not dispensing machines of any
kind.
The Computer Club at the University of Western Australia also has a coke
machine. As one of the chief perpetrators, I can tell you something about
it.
It all started way back in '92 (remember that year?). We had heard the
rumours about the CMU and MIT machines, and decided that this was something
we just had to do. A few phone calls to coke, we found someone sympathetic
to our cause, and explained what we wanted to do. It took a bit of
explaining (these people had never heard of the internet), but when they
understood what we were babbling about, they were (somewhat) enthusiastic
about the project. A few rules were bent, and we got an old machine on
loan.
Hack hack drill solder. Our coke machine got a 68000 based board and power
supply and relay drivers bolted to the insides. Some quick test software
was writted (a very simple monitor with commands to drop a can from slot
n), and a terminal was attached. In case you're interested, the controller
board is an 8MHz 68000 with 16K EPROM, 64K SRAM, and a 68681 DUART. A few
I/O ports were attached later (74LS373 and 244).
Months passed. People got told 'The hardware works. Come on - we need
software'. The software didn't happen. Phototransistors were added to sense
the 'sold out' lights on the front. The software didn't happen.
Blinkenlights were added (a bit-scrambled grey code. the scrambling changes
every 10 seconds or so). The software didn't happen.
Then at last, the software was written. It still uses the old test monitor,
but the UNIX end (running on our Sun) has accounting and various other nice
features. You can still get a free can by unplugging the Sun, sticking a
terminal into the plug, and typing 'D6' (slot 6 is where the coke usually
lives. We number them from right to left).
Anyway. finger c...@gu.uwa.edu.au will give you very little information on
what is in the machine at the moment, and is probably wrong (the
optosensors are playing up). We have a program called 'dispense' which will
drop cans and remove credits from your account. 'dispense coke' searches
for a non-empty slot containing coke, and sends the appropriate command to
the machine. 'dispense' without any parameters displays an evil curses menu
and lets you select the drink from that.
People involved:
Hardware:
John West j...@gu.uwa.edu.au
Dav g...@uniwa.uwa.edu.au
Software:
DDT d...@gu.uwa.edu.au
Peter Lewis pe...@gu.uwa.edu.au
Talking to coke:
Comrade comr...@gu.uwa.edu.au
ObHack: Apart from the coke machine you mean? Umm... How about the Z80
board with programmable clock speed? A few unused address lines were fed
into the clock generator. Jump to a different shadow of the ROM, and the
machine changed speed. Andrew wanted a speaker, microphone, and PLL on it
instead. Whistle to get it started.
John West
--
For the humour impaired: Insert a :-) after every third word
|
