Smart Flashlight Offers Programmability

By Michael Santo
Contributing Writer, RealTechNews

The AngusNoble.com Indium SMART Flashlight … when I first heard about this, I figured … “you’ve got to kidding, right?” After reading through the user manual … 20 pages, by the way (you can download it as well as the software … despite the fact the flashlight itself is still not available … from here) … well, I’m still not sure. To be honest, it seems like more than I need a flashlight to do … and I can’t imagine those people who have trouble programming a VCR figuring this out.

There are two buttons that can be programmed. If you look at the photo, there is a button on the body; there is also a button at the rear of the flashlight. The body button is “more” programmable than the “tail” button; the tail button can only be set to modify the output level. The body button can be programmed for different behaviors depending if the button is “held” or “pressed”.

The flashlight is modular in that you can swap out the LED module for a different one if you want; as far as programmability goes you can modify the “held speed”, program sequences of flashes (say, for Morse Code), modify gamma correction (yes, gamma correction) … and of course the whole unit connects via USB and you can upload new configurations to it. Via the website URL I listed earlier, Angus Noble even encourages people to upload their own custom configurations. Pricing is not yet available.

We Say: I could perhaps see some uses for this, but only if you could load multiple configurations into the unit and switch between them on-the-fly. Or if there were more programmable buttons. Then you could load multiple Morse Code sequences. Currently, it can only hold one configuration and you have to use a PC to load a new one. Without that addition, this is a clever device for a technophile, but it really seems like overkill for most.
LED, Tech, Flashlight, RealTechNews