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There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

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Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#351

Post by blitzar »

exikyut wrote: post #239
csomar wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone was locked out in a building am staying at (40 something stories) for several hours. When I asked the concierge if I can have a look at the system, it turns out they had none. The whole thing communicated with AWS for some subscription SaaS that provided them with a front-end to register/block cards. And every tap anywhere (elevators/doors/locks) in the building communicated back with this system hosted on A…

I wonder what happened to the building when us-east-1 went down.

I wonder what happened to the building when the internet went down. How do you get into the room to reboot the router?

Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#352

Post by Ekaros »

sofixa wrote: post #299
csomar wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone was locked out in a building am staying at (40 something stories) for several hours. When I asked the concierge if I can have a look at the system, it turns out they had none. The whole thing communicated with AWS for some subscription SaaS that provided them with a front-end to register/block cards. And every tap anywhere (elevators/doors/locks) in the building communicated back with this system hosted on A…

> Absolute nightmare. Yes, but still probably a million times easier for both the building management and the software vendor to have a SaaS for that, than having to buy hardware to put somewhere in the building (with redundant power, cooling, etc.), and have someone deploy, install, manage, update, etc. all of that.

Easier maybe. But significantly worse. Parts of these systems have been build and engineered to be entirely reliable with automatic hand-overs when some component fails or with alternative routings when some connection is lost.

Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#353

Post by tialaramex »

pkolaczk wrote: post #217
pjmlp wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is why when folks nowadays say "you cannot use XYZ for embedded", given what most embedded systems look like, and what many of us used to code on 8 and 16 bit home computers, I can only assert they have no idea how powerful modern embedded systems have become. Now that it is a pity that when people talk about saving the planet everyone keeps rushing to dispoable electronics, what serves me to go by bycicle to w…

> Which is why when folks nowadays say "you cannot use XYZ for embedded", given what most embedded systems look like, and what many of us used to code on 8 and 16 bit home computers, I can only assert they have no idea how powerful modern embedded systems have become. Yet, I still need to wait about 1 second (!) after each key press when buying a parking ticket and the machine wants me to enter my license plate numbe…

There's no pressure to make a good product because nobody making this decision has to use the machine. Everywhere I've worked purchase decisions are made by somebody with no direct contact to the actual usage, maybe if you're lucky they at least asked the people who need the product what the requirements are, otherwise it's just whatever they (who don't use this product) thought would be good.

"Key presses are 15x slower than they should be" gets labelled P5 low priority bug report, whereas "New AI integration to predict lot income" is P0 must-fix because on Tuesday a sales guy told a potential customer that it'd be in the next version and apparently the lead looked interested so we're doing it.

Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#354

Post by forinti »

philipwhiuk wrote: post #339
st_goliath wrote: post #335

A lovely video from a Shenzhen factory, mass producing disposable vapes, in case someone's interested: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WohEiRvn2Dg+ Most likely a promotional from the looks of it. I myself stumbled over it a about a year ago, when someone posted it on an IRC channel.

Not great from a hygiene perspective given they never show it being sterilised after the manual check.

It's not that surprising that a company that sells these awful gadgets to people who don't really care about their own health would behave in such a manner.

Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#355

Post by ZiiS »

pkolaczk wrote: post #217
pjmlp wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is why when folks nowadays say "you cannot use XYZ for embedded", given what most embedded systems look like, and what many of us used to code on 8 and 16 bit home computers, I can only assert they have no idea how powerful modern embedded systems have become. Now that it is a pity that when people talk about saving the planet everyone keeps rushing to dispoable electronics, what serves me to go by bycicle to w…

> Which is why when folks nowadays say "you cannot use XYZ for embedded", given what most embedded systems look like, and what many of us used to code on 8 and 16 bit home computers, I can only assert they have no idea how powerful modern embedded systems have become. Yet, I still need to wait about 1 second (!) after each key press when buying a parking ticket and the machine wants me to enter my license plate numbe…

Whilst I can not see a motivation I refuse to accept that parking machines are not advisarial design. Why do they have haf a dozen things that look a bit like tap n pay if they are not trying to make it eaiser for card skimmers.

Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#356

Post by doublerabbit »

mrheosuper wrote: post #330

I just dont understand disposable vape. It's very easy to convert one into "reuseable": Add a charging port, a cheap li-po charger ic, some mechanism to let user refill the boiler. Disposeable vape should have not existed at first place

> Disposable vape should have not existed at first place

When herbal vapes for cannabis came in around 5-10 years ago, it was the catalyst that started all this. Pax are the main manufacturer of these disposable vapes and one of the first on the scene to push THC following with nicotine. These were originally expensive, bulky and seen as an luxury item. I bought one, an DeVinci Ascent, I loved it.

I used it to hide that I was smoking cannabis from my parents and all the opportunities to walk the families dog and get high were wasted by playing CS:S and getting high. Teenage-hood for you.

Coil driven vapes are a different ball-game. Require actual human intervention and know-how. They are refillable in a sensible way, coils need replacing and I've seen some very cool rigs.

A USB port is pointless if you know that the user isn't going to refill the cart. If you can produce the device cheaply and not get taxed for the environmental waste. Add the R&D costs, additional safety, additional materials for the tank. What do you do with the now empty toxic tank? There are additional costs for stocking vape shops to refill the liquid. The latter is a more sustainable business option than the former.

They know the playbook. They would much prefer for you to be out with mates, stop off at a newsagents, pick up some chemical brain-rotting Dragon Soup and grab an elf-bar. Act like a twat outside of the venue and then throw it on the ground. Anything to do with vaping is foul-play. The Alcohol biz is tightly knitted with the vape/smoking biz.

Disposable also gives you plausible deniability. They get in trouble, close up shop. Relabel their brand and start again.

Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#357

Post by lallysingh »

pkolaczk wrote: post #217
pjmlp wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is why when folks nowadays say "you cannot use XYZ for embedded", given what most embedded systems look like, and what many of us used to code on 8 and 16 bit home computers, I can only assert they have no idea how powerful modern embedded systems have become. Now that it is a pity that when people talk about saving the planet everyone keeps rushing to dispoable electronics, what serves me to go by bycicle to w…

> Which is why when folks nowadays say "you cannot use XYZ for embedded", given what most embedded systems look like, and what many of us used to code on 8 and 16 bit home computers, I can only assert they have no idea how powerful modern embedded systems have become. Yet, I still need to wait about 1 second (!) after each key press when buying a parking ticket and the machine wants me to enter my license plate numbe…

My first guess was debouncing. They assume that the switches are worn out, deeply weathered, and cheaply made. Each press will cause the signal to oscillate and they're taking their sweet time to register it.

When the device is new this is an absurd amount of time to wait. As the device degrades over 10, 20 years, that programming will keep it working the same. Awful the entire time, yes, but the same as the day it was new.

Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#358

Post by jon-wood »

fennecfoxy wrote: post #346
pkolaczk wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Which is why when folks nowadays say "you cannot use XYZ for embedded", given what most embedded systems look like, and what many of us used to code on 8 and 16 bit home computers, I can only assert they have no idea how powerful modern embedded systems have become. Yet, I still need to wait about 1 second (!) after each key press when buying a parking ticket and the machine wants me to enter my license plate numbe…

And the self service kiosks/checkouts at supermarkets. So infuriating! Like I'd have to try to make something that slow myself on purpose! Besides the fact that scanning a barcode seems beyond much of the general population, they do it so sloooow.

The self service kiosks are intentionally throttled when scanning barcodes, at a guess to prevent people accidentally scanning the previous/wrong item - I once had some problems with one and a staff member flipped it into supervisor mode at which point they were able to scan at the same rate you'd see at a manned checkout.

Re: There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape

#359

Post by wingtw »

GeertB wrote: post #72

For these devices the microcontroller needs to be super cheap. Microcontrollers like the Puya PY32 Series (e.g., PY32C642, PY32F002/F030) can cost in the $0.02 - $0.05 range for the kind of many-million volumes applicable for disposable vapes. These are 32-bit ARM Cortex M0 MCUs, running at a 24 MHz clock or similar, some with 24 KB of ROM and maybe 3 KB of RAM! To put into context: this is 3x the ROM/RAM of the ZX81…

idea for a hobby project for someone better versed in hw than me - create a computer that can at least run basic with the MCU from the disposable vape.. :)
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