Re:Working computer made out of Minecraft blocks
by calloc on Wednesday September 29, 2010 @11:45AM
(#1739820)
If the guy had implemented his ALU in LogicWorks, gatesim or in VHDL/Verilog on an FPGA it would not have received the same amount of attention it has.
The fact that Minecraft provides the basic required building blocks to make the various different logic gates, to allow an ALU to be built in the first place is amazing. The fact that someone took the time to sit down and calculate out how to use the building blocks and how to arrange them is novel.
Re:Working computer made out of Minecraft blocks
by scott_s on Wednesday September 29, 2010 @11:49AM
(#1739837)
I agree with that. I think it takes a special eye to look at a system and figure out how to get it to do something it wasn't designed for. Some people refer to this practice as hacking. I was not trying to lessen what he did, but explain why it's not a waste of time.
If he did this for a course, he would have just used a logic simulator (example: http://www.kolls.net/gatesim/), like I did for my intro to computer engineering course. I don't still have those designs, either, but I still have the knowledge. His simulator just happened to be Minecraft.