a thoughtful web.
Good ideas and conversation. No ads, no tracking.   Login or Take a Tour!
comment by kleinbl00
kleinbl00  ·  4104 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: A ridiculous phone app that I want




mk  ·  4104 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Ha. I've wondered about that.

Well, it definitely shouldn't advertise as 'free public wifi'. In fact, it should have it's own encryption, and only communicate with others that have the app. I imagine just turning it on, and seeing if it collects anything.

JakobVirgil  ·  4104 days ago  ·  link  ·  

the two issues you prolly already know. 1. to use bluetooth it has to be visible. 2. some phones may require manual linking.

possible solutions to problem 1. the app controlling visibility using a pseudo-random algorithm based on the clock. i.e. all the phones running the app turn on at seemingly random intervals talking to each other then disappearing.

problem 2 is troubling but I think I can solve it by shoving the info thru the capabilities. especially if we limit the usable characters to 64. the cool bit is that it would look like the phones are not even syncing up.

mk  ·  4104 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I like your solution 2 and this comment is sixty four characters

However, does that include the id of the sender as well?

The freeing aspect is that usefulness has been largely sacrificed upfront.

JakobVirgil  ·  4104 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Oh I was not clear 64 legal characters the 26 letters of the alphabet X 2 (upper and lower case) 0-9 and "?" , "." but maybe that is just a 6bit fantasy. during discovery bluetooth sends packets back and forth I think we just need to put the message and id in one of those packets. May need more research.

mk  ·  4103 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Ah I see. I have zero experience here. It sounds clever. So basically the phones never go passed pinging each other?

JakobVirgil  ·  4103 days ago  ·  link  ·  

If I can get it to work

mk  ·  4103 days ago  ·  link  ·  

You know I was just thinking, the Chinese gov would hate this.

JakobVirgil  ·  4103 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I think ours might too. I need to find low level bluetooth stuff to make it work.

mk  ·  4103 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Then it's surely worthwhile.

JakobVirgil  ·  4103 days ago  ·  link  ·  

it is a strange skill set to have

mk  ·  4103 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Well matched for the times.

JakobVirgil  ·  4103 days ago  ·  link  ·  

hopefully This has not been my experience so far.

mk  ·  4103 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Hemingway.