[Coco] Arduino as a Mouse/Keyboard interface?

[Mark McDougall]

On 5/07/2012 3:58 AM, Andrew wrote:

> Now - in the past (prior to the UNO), there were successful attempts using a
> custom shield to interface the 328P on the Arduino to USB as a host. I would
> be willing to imagine (not having seen the software in question, of course)
> that somebody out there has reprogrammed the 16U2/8U2 uC on the Uno to act
> in a similar manner - becoming a host interface.

I'm not doubting your claims, but I would be very interested to know how 
this was done, in particular, whether the same method could be used on other 
USB 'device' chips (FTR I've worked on the implementation both of USB hosts 
and devices). Sounds like someone got quite inventive/clever!

> Whether one could do keyboard and mouse at the same time, though, would be a
> different thing; the main issue would be memory (both flash and SRAM, but
> SRAM mainly, I think). Even so, a Mega could solve that issue.

I suspect the 'host' was jury-rigged to just do enough to enumerate the 
keyboard and elicit input reports from it; without knowing exactly how it 
was done it's difficult to say what additional resources are required for a 
2nd device. If the keyboard in question was a HID device (as I suspect it 
was) it may not require a lot more to talk to a HID mouse...

All pure speculation on my part, take with the requisite grain of salt.

Regards,

-- 
|              Mark McDougall                | "Electrical Engineers do it
|  <http://members.iinet.net.au/~msmcdoug>   |   with less resistance!"