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I've been designing a device in my head. This ought to exist, but if it does I'm not quite sure what it would be called or how I could find it. Maybe some of you other techies out there can point me in the right direction - or set me straight.
It started with my long-held desire for a replacement wireless router. ( some technical details )
Actually, such a box could be used for all sorts of things: a personal web server or disk server (plugging in a USB drive) come to mind. I can also see various places they could be used at work: at the moment when we need a new service (DHCP server, say), it often entails buying a new PC for reliability, even though that is vastly over-specced for the requirement. One of these boxes could do the job.
It could come with Linux and Apache pre-installed, and a few standard applications controlled via the web - like most routers are these days. It would allow ssh access so you could install additional software (or even install a different OS) or detailed configuration. As something that looks like consumer electronics, but is a fully-fledged PC, such a device could find all sorts user-developed applications - as has happened with, eg. PDAs, TiVo, the WRT54GL. (This would be helped along if all its software were Open Source.)
So, does such a thing exist, or am I missing some point as to why it's more complicated to do what I propose? Maybe a processor sufficient to act even as a home router, low-traffic web or disk server is more expensive or hotter than I imagine.
It started with my long-held desire for a replacement wireless router. ( some technical details )
Actually, such a box could be used for all sorts of things: a personal web server or disk server (plugging in a USB drive) come to mind. I can also see various places they could be used at work: at the moment when we need a new service (DHCP server, say), it often entails buying a new PC for reliability, even though that is vastly over-specced for the requirement. One of these boxes could do the job.
It could come with Linux and Apache pre-installed, and a few standard applications controlled via the web - like most routers are these days. It would allow ssh access so you could install additional software (or even install a different OS) or detailed configuration. As something that looks like consumer electronics, but is a fully-fledged PC, such a device could find all sorts user-developed applications - as has happened with, eg. PDAs, TiVo, the WRT54GL. (This would be helped along if all its software were Open Source.)
So, does such a thing exist, or am I missing some point as to why it's more complicated to do what I propose? Maybe a processor sufficient to act even as a home router, low-traffic web or disk server is more expensive or hotter than I imagine.
