#+SETUPFILE: ../../../template/level-2.org
#+TITLE: PiPhone
#+DATE: <2016-04-30 Sat 01:13>
#+AUTHOR: vaeringjar
#+EMAIL: vaeringjar@land
#+DESCRIPTION: PiPhone project and the PocketChip look like a basis for a freer mobile hardware.
#+KEYWORDS: diy, phone, mobile


* Post

I found the PiPhone accidentally a little while back. At first I just
thought of it as a way to finally repurpose my raspberry pi; I have
never really felt happy with it and it requires blogs. My current
mobile certainly does me no justice for freedom since I currently have
the stock Android, though I run F-droid.

But then I remembered the PocketChip, a very libre friendly
project. At this point I know little about the OS, except that it
looks like Debian. Forgive my ignorance, please, because it will
probably get worse before it gets better. For a working mobile, it
looks like I would only need the radio system, a controller UI, a link
between them, and cables and power. At first I did not realize that
the GSM modules contained the aural connectors. I thought the
controller UI, in the PiPhone case the Raspberry Pi, needed to handle
all SMS and voice. However, the GSM module, which super encapsulates
both the radio connections and the voice, already has IO built onto
most boards.

Thus the last crucial piece comes down to the link between the radio
and the controller. I have had some issues with USB to serial in the
past. But all of this Arduino technology looks much nicer than the
proprietary systems I have previously programmed.

The hardware store down the street has plenty of high voltage outlet
boxes that I can easily repurpose for a crude housing for the
radio. After that, I only need to afix the PocketChip once I have
one. By the time I finish the prototype it will probably look worse
than a mobile or wireless phone from the 1980s.

Depending on the actual module, I might reuse climberhunt's
program. At worse, at first I will just create a command line
interface and then add a GUI on top of that later. Though I think
evetually I would like to abstract the controller UI into something
that will work with a set of GSM modules.


* References

- [PiPhone](https://github.com/climberhunt/PiPhone)
- [pocketchip](http://getchip.com/pages/pocketchip)
- [sim900](http://www.micro4you.com/store/sim900-gprs/gsm-module.html)
- [Elecfreaks wiki on the sim900](http://www.elecfreaks.com/wiki/index.php?title=EFCom_Pro_GPRS/GSM_Module#Cautions)
- [USB to serial](http://www.elecfreaks.com/estore/xbee-btbee-usb-adapter-shd17.html)
- [Adafruit GSM kit](https://www.adafruit.com/products/2523)
