# Smartphones



## BryanJ62 (Sep 7, 2014)

*I don't own one but I need someone who not only owns one but understands in inner workings of them. If that person is you drop me a line. I'll explain the method to my madness than. Thanks!!!*


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## Pluralized (Sep 7, 2014)

*The interwebs are your friend. 


*


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## BryanJ62 (Sep 7, 2014)

*Sure, make me look lazy 

With the story I'm working on I want to get some actual feedback from people. But thank you for the link. It does help.*


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## Pluralized (Sep 7, 2014)

The least I could do, Bryan. The very least. 

Wonder how many people will have intimate working knowledge of the phone's innards? Knowing this forum, probably a few. Ha! Good luck man.


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## BryanJ62 (Sep 7, 2014)

*Here's the action: Imagine you are tossed back in time - lets say 1942 - You meet a curious man who loves to experiment and create things. He takes it apart and studies it. What would a man with his mind see? What questions would he ask? What could he do with it?*


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## Pluralized (Sep 7, 2014)

I'm not an electronics expert, but there are a couple o' challenges with this premise: 

First, when disassembling a smartphone, you typically have to know how it comes apart or it's a real bitch to do. There are special screws that they wouldn't even know what to do with in that era. Tiny Tamper-Torx style screwheads and such, and in 1942 they were still hammering rivets to assemble steel buildings. 

Also, the PCB wasn't a thing, so it would look really odd and alien to him. I'm sure, if he realized it was such a magnificent device, he'd be curious about its innards, but things were so different then. Working parts, of even the most intricate device, could be seen and mechanical engineering understood much more readily. To see a solid-state device working makes sense when we look at the screen, but the rest of it's pretty damn boring. The battery would seem to be a simple rectangular case, not much going on.

There was a huge war on, also -- maybe impacts his interest in the device? And in that year, there was no 4G or LTE or signals or GPS or interwebs. So the smartphone is just a bright rectangle.

The thing that fascinates me, and probably holds some promise (if you agree), is the gyroscope and the accelerometer mechanisms, though they're so small I don't know if you could even tell what they are.

Anyway - good luck man. I think the functionality of a smartphone is the thing, and the device itself much less fun.


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## BryanJ62 (Sep 7, 2014)

*Love your input. This is what I need. Here's another layer: You know the guy sitting in front of you is from the year 2014. You envy him. You know this odd device is something amazing. He hasn't told you what it is yet but your gut tells you it's, lets use the word revolutionary. He begins to tell you what it does and since it has no further use for him in your time (1942) he gives it to you. Now it's your turn to play with it. What will you do? Keep in mind the 1942 character is very smart, eccentric, curious, etc... *


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## ppsage (Sep 7, 2014)

In 1942, if he's (she's) some kind of genius, he'd discover how much semi-conducting materials can replace (comparatively) giant vacuum tubes. In the peripheral bits.  He might guess at micro-circuitry's purpose, but I'd doubt he'd get anything immediately useful out of it. The electronic principles behind the display might be somewhat accessible from his tech base.


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## Pluralized (Sep 7, 2014)

Porn, withoutadoubt. 

I suppose it would depend on what he told me about it. Keep in mind things were tactile back then, so a touch-screen would be very foreign and require a great deal of getting used to, as would staring at small type on an illuminated screen. Probably, finding Google, or some similar search engine (keeping in mind, of course, that there was no infrastructure and therefore the 'smart' phone is merely a small computer), all manner of greedy and nefarious things could be done. Absent the interwebs, I'd use it for calculations related to helping the war effort. A fast computer like that could be used for deciphering code, fast-mapping. Digital photos, satellite reconnoissance. 

A translator app would be most useful in those days, as would the digital voice recorder and videocamera. 

Also, porn.


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## BryanJ62 (Sep 7, 2014)

*So what you're saying is, the smartphone would work in some way. Like you said, calculations and so on. The voice recorder and video camera would work. Correct? *


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## BryanJ62 (Sep 7, 2014)

*PPsage - Whereabouts in Oregon do you live? It would be funny if we lived on the same block. *


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## Pluralized (Sep 7, 2014)

BryanJ62 said:


> *So what you're saying is, the smartphone would work in some way. Like you said, calculations and so on. The voice recorder and video camera would work. Correct? *



Er, if the battery was charged, yes. Once the battery died though -- yer screwed. Unless you had the wall charger.


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## ppsage (Sep 7, 2014)

Rural Northwest OR


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## Morkonan (Sep 7, 2014)

Pluralized said:


> Er, if the battery was charged, yes. Once the battery died though -- yer screwed. Unless you had the wall charger.



In my opinion, someone familiar with electronics, like an electronic repair guy, could figure out that the battery required charging and could point out the battery and its terminals. They could, with appropriate tools, figure out how to charge the battery, but they might not make much sense out of certain connectors on the battery, like ones used for diagnostics and reporting.

An electronic engineer from that time would have a field day with a "smartphone", though. However, there may be some technological leaps that don't have the required precursors in their age. Still, as far as I know, with the exception of certain materials, everything in the smartphone could be figured out by a qualified electronic engineer of that period. That doesn't mean they'd be able to code for it, though. But, they could figure out the individual components and many of their functions. Some things, like simple memory chips, wouldn't have analogues (lol...) in their current tech, so they wouldn't be easily deduced. But, once the battery was charged or a comparable power supply found, since the voltages and specs are already written on the battery, the purpose for all the little gizmos in the guts would become very apparent. Since there is so much info being stored and we already know that this does this, then that _must_ do that... etc. Operating frequencies and such would be discernible, but the transmission encryption schemes would not. They would, however, know that the transmission is encrypted in some way, but wouldn't be able to "break it" in order to study its content. Various components, like GPS and even gimbal sensors, would be discernible after a time, but they'd lack the understanding of what transmissions the GPS is relying on in order to deduce a position. But, then again, they could make an intellectual leap and come to understand that a universal coordinate system managed by satellites would do the trick. 

However, if you went further back in time to a point where too many technological precursors were absent, you'd find that nobody could make much sense of such a device. At that point, it's "magic."


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## BryanJ62 (Sep 7, 2014)

*Excellent stuff, Morkonan. With your permission I may have to use some of the info you posted. Here's a question pertaining to "magic". By 1942 we were nearing the computer age. With WWII it might have already arrived. Recently I read in 1946 the University of Pennsylvania created ENIAC (Electric Numerical Integrator and Computer). It was a 30 ton machine. Over 17,000 vacuum tubes, 70,000 resisters and 10,000 capacitors. It took up a 30x50 room. In a nutshell it was a giant calculator. But it was a start. I'm with you where an electronic engineer or an extremely intelligent person with a knack of figuring things out would be in high heaven with a smartphone.   *


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## Pluralized (Sep 7, 2014)

They would probably break it getting it apart, guys. But, these were the minds that created the atomic bomb. I bet Feynman could've figured out the tech, but I still maintain they lacked prerequisite tools and that would be a barrier. It's easy to destroy a smartphone battery without even trying. An endlessly fascinating conundrum though!


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## BryanJ62 (Sep 7, 2014)

*But, you might have a person from our time warning them of that*.


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## count58 (Sep 10, 2014)

A person with no smartphone?
That's interesting ... check out the nearest online store.


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