This report about #Wacom graphics tablets is disturbing for a couple of reasons.

1. They are surveilling users of their #tablet - a human-interface device analogous to a mouse or trackball - recording every application you open, or when you switch between windows of different applications. They are collecting this data via a trip through Google Analytics, aka Spyware Central. There is no possible way to justify collection of this particular data; it is none of their damn business how long you have your drawing program focused before switching to your browser and back again. The author notes their privacy policy really doesn't describe this collection of data correctly, so there really can't be informed consent in the first place.

2. Why on earth is it possible in #Apple #OSX / #MacOS for a USB human interface device driver to capture this information in the first place? Apple shares a big slice of the blame here - this should just simply not be possible for the driver to collect in the first place. Having such a driver allowed to place outgoing HTTP requests is also a big "WTF are they thinking?" moment.

https://robertheaton.com/2020/02/05/wacom-drawing-tablets-track-name-of-every-application-you-open/

#google #GoogleAnalytics #spyware #surveillance #spying #crapware #GraphicsTablet #DeviceDriver #USB #HID #HumanInterfaceDevice #driver #privacy

Keyboard input shouldn't be a one way channel. If the app could give hints to the input device, Android keyboard wouldn't need access to contacts, the app could give any hints that are contextually relevant. Also on desktop live handwriting recognition would be easier with contextual autocompletion

#computing #humanInterfaceDevice #ocr

Turning Horrible Browser Controls Into A Game https://hackaday.com/2024/07/15/turning-horrible-browser-controls-into-a-game/ #humaninterfacedevice #usbvolumecontrol #javascript #breakout #knob-out #browser #volume #Games #game

Latency Meter For Accurate Gaming https://hackaday.com/2023/09/19/latency-meter-for-accurate-gaming/ #humaninterfacedevice #inputlatency #inputlag #arduino #latency #monitor #gaming #timing #Games #mouse #speed #hid #lag

The other day I asked "is the tongue a tentacle?" I was wondering because I had just been introduced to a pointing device that sits inside your mouth and is controlled by your tongue. Really! It is called the "MouthPad".

https://www.augmental.tech/

#mouse #pointer #humaninterfacedevice #hid #tongue #tentacles #accessibility #gizmos

Vintage Remote Control Gets Bluetooth Upgrade

This swanky Magnavox remote is old enough to predate the use of infrared, and actually relies on ultrasound to communicate with the television. It's a neat conversation starter, but not terribly useful today. Which is why [Chad Lawson] decided to gut the original electronics and replace it with a Adafruit Feather 32u4 Bluefruit LE that can actually talk to modern devices.

We know, we know. Some in the audience will probably take offense to such a cool gadget being unceremoniously torn apart, but to be fair, [Chad] does say he has a second one that will remain in its original state. Plus a quick check on eBay shows these old remotes don't seem to be particularly rare or valuable. In fact, after some browsing through the recently concluded auctions, we're fairly sure he paid $27 USD for both of these remotes.

Anyway, [Chad] found that a piece of perfboard in his collection just happened to be nearly the same size as the PCB from the remote, which made the rest of the conversion pretty straightforward. He simply had to mount tactile switches on one side of the perfboard so the remote's original buttons would hit them when pressed, and then wire those to the Adafruit on the other side. We know there's a 3.7 V 500 mAh pouch battery in there someplace as well, though it's not immediately clear where he hid it in the images.

The code [Chad] came up with tells the Adafruit to mimic a Bluetooth Human Interface Device (HID) and send standard key codes to whatever device pairs with it. That makes it easy to use as a media remote on the computer, for example. We've seen something similar done with the ESP32, if you've already got one in the parts bin and are looking to revamp a remote control of your own.

At the end of the write-up, [Chad] mentions he may try developing an ultrasonic receiver that can pick up the signals from the unmodified remote control. That would be a nice way to bring this whole thing full circle, and should appease even the most hardcore vintage remote control aficionados.

#classichacks #peripheralshacks #bluetooth #humaninterfacedevice #tvremote #ultrasonic #vintagehardware

This ESP32 Bluetooth Page Turner Can’t Get Any Easier

Commercial Bluetooth pedals, designed to allow musicians to flip pages of sheet music on a tablet, have the sort of inflated price tag you'd expect for a niche electronic device. Rather than forking as much as $100 USD over for the privilege of hands-free page flipping, [Joonas Pihlajamaa] decided to build his own extremely low cost version using an ESP32 and a cheap foot pedal switch.

In terms of hardware, it does't get much easier than this. All [Joonas] had to do was hook the pedal up to one of the ESP32's digital pins, and plug the microcontroller into a USB power bank. From there, it became a software project. With the ESP32-BLE-Keyboard library, it only took a few lines of code to send RIGHT_ARROW or LEFT_ARROW depending on whether the pedal was quickly tapped or held down for a bit; allowing him to navigate back and forth through the pages with just one button.

[Joonas] mentions that the ESP32 development board he's using is too large to fit inside the pedal itself, though we wonder if the bare module could get slipped in there someplace. Of course you could always build your own pedal with a bit of extra room to fit the electronics, but for less than $2 USD on AliExpress, it's hard to go wrong with this turn-key unit.

Looking for an alternate approach? We covered a Bluetooth page turner last month that doubled the inputs and packed it all into a handsome wooden enclosure.

#peripheralshacks #bluetooth #humaninterfacedevice #pageturner #pedal