
/dev/zero has infinite electrons and /dev/null has an infinite appetite for them - sgt
http://www.linusakesson.net/programming/pipelogic/index.php
======
sgt
This is a typical Linus Akesson project. Highly eccentric, potentially useless
for practical applications, and extremely intelligent. I certainly approve.

~~~
exDM69
If someone is not familiar with the works of Mr. Åkesson, I suggest you check
out his YouTube videos: <http://www.youtube.com/user/lftkryo/videos>

He likes playing Chiptune songs with eccentric DIY instruments.

~~~
sgt
My bad - Åkesson, not Akesson! I have one in my iTunes that sounds like
regular piano music at first, then these chiptune sounds sneak in and
strangely enough it all sounds harmonic and rather pleasant to listen to.

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kolektiv
I can't help feeling that /dev/zero produces neutrons rather than electrons.

~~~
archangel_one
I see your point, but something producing a stream of neutrons sounds a bit
like a self-sustaining nuclear reaction which might be tricky to manage as a
device node :)

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tectonic
"So there it is. We've been able to construct gates and flip flops using
nothing but UNIX pipes and our small MOSFET tool. We may now proceed to design
any digital circuits we want: Processors, memories, entire computers... The
world is ours to conquer!

As long as we don't run out of PIDs."

~~~
caf
...or memory. Each logical zero is taking up 64k of kernel memory.

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wwkeyboard
This reminds me of a problem we used to debate in college; on a perfectly
efficient machine, would `cat /dev/random > /dev/null` violate the second law
of thermodynamics?

~~~
garethadams
If you're violating the laws of physics in your assumption ("on a perfectly
efficient machine") you can't expect them to hold for your hypothesis.

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tlrobinson
Who needs VHDL when you have sh?

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warmwaffles
I laughed when I read the title, this was a fun read

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dbbolton
Tangential question: why does /dev/null have an md5sum but /dev/zero doesn't?

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micaeked
i'm guessing because /dev/zero never stops

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MidwestMuster
"If there is a NAND, people will build computers. I've seen that effect with
Minecraft. But using unix pipes is just awesome, too :D" (first comment from
post)

~~~
raverbashing
Yes, it's true, you can build a whole computer from NAND gates

Or NOR gates like this one:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_Guidance_Computer#Design>

~~~
cdcarter
TECS (<http://www1.idc.ac.il/tecs/>) is a great book that leads you through
that entire process, too!

~~~
vishvananda
Another great book along these lines is CODE, by charles petzold:

<http://www.charlespetzold.com/code/>

He starts with electricity and builds all the way up to modern computers. It
isn't a hands on guide, but it is a very entertaining read.

