Part Idea: Manual Input Bit

[Randy]

It would be neat if there could be a Bit that does not change direction via marbles, but would easily allow a person to flip its direction while the program is running (perhaps by using a modified Bit piece that is weighted to not flip from weight of marbles, or maybe added friction, but that a user can easily switch by twisting the protruding peg). I know you can use the green Ramp as a “hard-coded” Bit, but these are meant to depict hard-coded logic, and not user-interaction. Plus, it would be a pain to constantly pull out and replace these mid-program, and they don’t really stand out as user-inputs.

This idea of user-input would open the doors to a host of new puzzles and even games by providing more ways for a user to interact with the computer by flipping various Bits while the program is running.

[paul]

Hi Randy,

You can do something like that with this setup:

When a ball goes through the 3 gear bits, they return to their initial position at the end, but the ball leaves either to the left or to the right depending on which way the gear bits were pointing. The only way to change the direction of the gear bits it to manually turn them.

[Randy]

Thanks for the info.
My wife and I actually just got to the puzzle in the book where we start using the Gear Bit, so looks like I jumped the gun a little on proposing the Manual Input Bit since you already have something like that.

[paul]

No problem. I would have done the same thing. Way to think ahead!