Power activity

Power activity

Introduction

Make an Activity for laptop charging, geared towards people who are using/developing off-grid power sources (especially human-powered ones).

The screen should display the voltage, amperage, wattage that the charger is currently supplying to the laptop (with the option of several units - instead of "watts," show pictures of how many lightbulbs you'd light with the same wattage, etc.) as well as a best guess as to what percentage of the battery is charged. When the battery is fully charged, a 15-minute "keep charging!" timer should start so that the user will be encouraged to keep going to recondition the battery (and extend its life).

Status

(in response to Wade)

No code in git yet (started working on this yesterday and spent most of yesterday learning GTK), but I'm hoping to have an interface Activity stub in a repo today or tomorrow, and then start plugging the back end into the various battery charge indicators. It's not going to require any specialized hardware - the code is going to display the values we're already getting for battery info somewhere (basically making that info transparent) - so you could theoretically plug your XO into the wall outlet, though having some form of variable charge input (adjustable power supply, hand crank...) will make it more exciting. Mchua 09:50, 6 May 2008 (EDT)

How to help

This project is a collaboratively organized undertaking, so the best way to get started is to just dive in and introduce yourself. Mel is working on a first prototype that should be done by Wednesday, May 7 - in the meantime, design/interface suggestions are super-welcome (list below, or draw images of mockups and attach them).

Visual element options