Talk:2317: Pinouts

Can we add this one to a new category, "Comics that Randall makes just to screw with xkcd wiki contributors"? I can think of plenty of candidates for this category! Cosmogoblin (talk) 21:42, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

The claim that a coax has only one conductive part is incorrect. It has two. The pin is the inner conductor. The shield is the outer conductor. Without both it wouldn't work.

I'd also say that the claim at the top that a pin can have only one bit or one voltage of power at a time is incorrect. Power over Ethernet is a perfect example of power and data at the same time. There are also plenty of types of signals which transmit multiple bits at once. A simple example would be a signal using four voltage levels to transmit two bits simultaneously, but there are many more fancy analog encodings that use phase and frequency and other characteristics to transmit data. Plus, you can often included two signals on the same conductors. For example, ADSL combined a normal phone signal and a higher frequency data signal on the same lines. Also cable TV combined many signals on one set of conductors.

So, anyway, I'd remove the claim. Mootstrap (talk) 23:00, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Just because it’s interesting: DCC with RailCom+ allows some cool stuff. It allows many-to-many high-power power transmission, robust many-to-many bidirectional data transmission, hot-swap with automatic configuration and collision resolution, physical position tracking of the connected devices, some way of short-circuit resolution with continued communication, mixing with other protocols, and all with only two pins, which may be arbitrarily interchanged at any time. Admittedly it has a much lower data rate than Power over Ethernet and terrible EMI, but potentially much higher power. 162.158.89.193 08:22, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

For that matter, the RF cable connecting a regular TV antenna, or the wire in a car that connects the radio antenna, carries the signals of all the channels.172.69.33.65 02:20, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

I think "Pin Roulette" is a pun on Penn Jillette, the talkative half of the Penn & Teller magic act, and maybe also a reference to chatroulette. Barmar (talk) 23:10, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Possible, but I'd stick with the simple explanation - that the "Pin Roulette" pin selects a random function when the connector's plugged in. 108.162.245.64 23:18, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Modern conectors additionally tend to have multi-purpose pins, which might be dangerous if you guess the current meaning of the pin wrong.Gunterkoenigsmann (talk) 06:15, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

In addition to pins being able to carry both data and power, or to carry multiple bits at a time, some pins function as clock signal pins that indicate bit boundaries rather than themselves carrying data; therefore I also think the claim should be either omitted or changed entirely. Vaedez (talk) 23:33, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Firstly, no Soup? Secondly, GNDN might easily have been referenced. Thirdly, would a pin made of solder melt, as pins connected to wires/boards by solder do not melt the solder (under proper range of use). 141.101.107.158 23:38, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

i think the implication is that it could melt, which is a trap--Vaedez (talk) 23:48, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Perhaps we should add the actual usage of the pins to help those who actually want to know? 162.158.62.245 00:08, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

Wouldn't 3.3eV/C be a tiny fraction of 3.3V, since a columb is a much greater value of charge than that of the electron?--172.69.63.203 00:24, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

Depending on how you read it, the third pin from the top might match the 120V AC. This would make it a different kind of "tribute" to FireWire... EHusmark (talk) 07:52, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

AFAIK FireWire allows many-to-many communication, while USB never did. The FireWire tribute pin could be a way to establish many-to-many communication. Alternatively, FireWire allows daisy-chaining, while USB supports only a tree network trough hubs. The FireWire pin could be somehow physically strange, so a second USB-C cable could be connected to it. 162.158.89.193 08:22, 9 June 2020 (UTC)