This is How Kinect Gets ''Hacked''
Here's how to reverse-engineer Kinect's motor.
So after reading your fill of reports about open-source drivers and user-created applications for Microsoft's Kinect motion-sensing controller, now seems like a good time to test your creative juices. Where do yo start, especially if you're a novice? Good thing you asked.
Ladyada from Adafruit Industries--the group behind the original contest to see who could create open-source drivers first--has published a guide on how the company helped steer the winner to create the Kinect driver while also offering instructions on how to reverse-engineer other USB devices in the process.
"USB is a very complex protocol, much more complicated than Serial or Parallel, SPI and even I2C," Ladyada explained. "USB uses only two wires but they are not used as 'receive' and 'transmit' like serial. Rather, data is bidirectional and differential--that is the data sent depends on the difference in voltage between the two data lines D+ and D- If you want to do more USB hacking, you'll need to read Jan Axelson's USB Complete books , they're easy to follow and discuss USB in both depth and breadth."
Unfortunately, the instructions only focus on the Kinect's motor. However it does point out that Kinect comprises of four USB devices: the motor, the camera, the microphone and a hub, the latter of which is used to combine the three components into a single cable. Curious minds should be able to apply the technique to the two other USB-based components.
Enthusiasts looking to take on Kinect should head here. The drawback is that you'll need a Mac or Linux system in addition to a PC-based rig to perform the reverse-engineering.
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Man, I wish I had the free time to do that. This is the way technology is supposed to be, distributed, open, and free for all to innovate. I feel like companies who are refusing to be a little more open and incite innovation will be tossed into the tar pits like Blockbuster when they refused to acknowledge and get on with streaming. Our industries are becoming globalized, by way of technology. Any refusal to admit that will result in becoming antiquated, obsolete, and "Remember ********?"
Man, I wish I had the free time to do that. This is the way technology is supposed to be, distributed, open, and free for all to innovate. I feel like companies who are refusing to be a little more open and incite innovation will be tossed into the tar pits like Blockbuster when they refused to acknowledge and get on with streaming. Our industries are becoming globalized, by way of technology. Any refusal to admit that will result in becoming antiquated, obsolete, and "Remember ********?"
I see your blockbuster, and I raise you a Microsoft whom is one of the two or three largest tech companies in the world and the iconic example of closed door operations.
Open-ness matters to the consumer if and ONLY if it inhibits them from using their product in a way they envisioned. Most of them don't envision hacking the command codes from Kinect. And this silly notion that the consumer will care if there isn't a way to install linux onto it and use whatever random text editor to write their code in is silly.
My understanding of the article is that this is basically the hardest level of hacking: taking raw output, trying to guess what it means and feeding in raw input and watching to see what happens.
Oh and that's a female hacker
I see your blockbuster, and I raise you a Microsoft whom is one of the two or three largest tech companies in the world and the iconic example of closed door operations.Open-ness matters to the consumer if and ONLY if it inhibits them from using their product in a way they envisioned. Most of them don't envision hacking the command codes from Kinect. And this silly notion that the consumer will care if there isn't a way to install linux onto it and use whatever random text editor to write their code in is silly. My understanding of the article is that this is basically the hardest level of hacking: taking raw output, trying to guess what it means and feeding in raw input and watching to see what happens. Oh and that's a female hacker
It is complicated, but awesome. And worth it if you get satisfaction from doing something others can't.
While I agree MOST consumers are only conscious of openness once they are denied a feature they believed their product to have, I have to say though, not ALL consumers only care if their product can't be used in a way they envisioned pre-purchase. Some consumers get joy of ENABLING their products to do something that nobody envisioned pre-purchase, which is where open-source and innovation comes into play.
If Bob Chandler never put 48 inch tires on his truck and crushed other cars in a field in 1981, we would have no monster trucks. I bet when he got it that was not his "envisioned way" of using his truck when he bought it. Experimenting, research, and development are the tools of progress. Refusing any of these three and you will be left behind.
I still do not understand why people still insist on calling it hacking or the kinect being hacked, nothing has been modified on the kinect or xbox, its just writing third party drivers.
so by what everyone is saying writing a driver for a piece of hardware for linux is hacking?
so if i wrote a driver for say a printer that is only windows compat is hacking?
I still do not understand why people still insist on calling it hacking or the kinect being hacked, nothing has been modified on the kinect or xbox, its just writing third party drivers.so by what everyone is saying writing a driver for a piece of hardware for linux is hacking?so if i wrote a driver for say a printer that is only windows compat is hacking?
It's not the word we use that is important, it is the meaning behind it.
Oh and that's a female hacker
Hmm, isn't this the chick who had a guide on how to build your own iPhone battery charger? That was also pretty cool.
I still do not understand why people still insist on calling it hacking or the kinect being hacked, nothing has been modified on the kinect or xbox, its just writing third party drivers.so by what everyone is saying writing a driver for a piece of hardware for linux is hacking?so if i wrote a driver for say a printer that is only windows compat is hacking?
If you don't have the spec of the internals of the printer you'll have to hack to figure out how to write the driver. So the hacking is to get the information to write the driver not just writing the driver.
"The drawback is that you'll need a Mac or Linux system in addition to a PC-based rig to perform the reverse-engineering."
I don't see a drawback here =D
Man, I wish I had the free time to do that. This is the way technology is supposed to be, distributed, open, and free for all to innovate. I feel like companies who are refusing to be a little more open and incite innovation will be tossed into the tar pits like Blockbuster when they refused to acknowledge and get on with streaming. Our industries are becoming globalized, by way of technology. Any refusal to admit that will result in becoming antiquated, obsolete, and "Remember ********?"
If it were free and open then Kinect wouldn't exist. Open source developers may have a hayday with this thing (and I hope they do) but they couldn't have come up with in on their own. Something like this takes lots and lots of capital and it is born from someones desire to make money...not be all kumbaya.
Man, I wish I had the free time to do that. This is the way technology is supposed to be, distributed, open, and free for all to innovate. I feel like companies who are refusing to be a little more open and incite innovation will be tossed into the tar pits like Blockbuster when they refused to acknowledge and get on with streaming. Our industries are becoming globalized, by way of technology. Any refusal to admit that will result in becoming antiquated, obsolete, and "Remember ********?"
Eh only reason Kinect even came into existence is because someone funded for it's development and mass production. I'm all for opeb but the only reason open software works so well because software only need time and knowledge. Hardware requires money and material.
At least thank M$ for developing the hardware/software and the production of the item.
If it were free and open then Kinect wouldn't exist. Open source developers may have a hayday with this thing (and I hope they do) but they couldn't have come up with in on their own. Something like this takes lots and lots of capital and it is born from someones desire to make money...not be all kumbaya.
Eh only reason Kinect even came into existence is because someone funded for it's development and mass production. I'm all for opeb but the only reason open software works so well because software only need time and knowledge. Hardware requires money and material. At least thank M$ for developing the hardware/software and the production of the item.
Clarification: I am not talking about Kinect being made by M$, I am talking about this lady making a guide to creating your own program for it. THAT is what is good.
I still do not understand why people still insist on calling it hacking or the kinect being hacked, nothing has been modified on the kinect or xbox, its just writing third party drivers.so by what everyone is saying writing a driver for a piece of hardware for linux is hacking?so if i wrote a driver for say a printer that is only windows compat is hacking?
If you have the driver specification, it's simply coding a driver. When you have to figure out how the machine works first and then write the driver, it's hacking.
If you don't have the spec of the internals of the printer you'll have to hack to figure out how to write the driver. So the hacking is to get the information to write the driver not just writing the driver.
If you have the driver specification, it's simply coding a driver. When you have to figure out how the machine works first and then write the driver, it's hacking.
Sounds like reverse engineering to me.