HP Voyager / KINOMI / KEMU / et, al..

[uhmgawa]

Hi Folks,
Years ago I developed a reduced footprint system emulator for the Voyager calculator series. It also supports all 10/11/12/15C models to be co-resident in the same image. For those unfamiliar, the effort was in part documented here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=12Ef97h9UE8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBRcheWsSdc

That was back in 2011, and unbeknownst to me HP was preparing the 15C LE for product introduction. Complicating things further, there was also an unrelated effort at the time where someone was attempting to commercially produce clones of the voyagers. Although my motivation was quite different and fundamentally an effort to capture this past technology milestone for those interested to experiment, as well as a means to preserve HP's work in an open development project, the intention may have become obscured or encumbered by the other events.

Logistically such an open project requires use of the original HP firmware from all versions in the series. Various debates/theories circulated of whether HP had a copyright claim on the work, or even if so whether it was enforceable, etc.. But my view was either HP would give a nod to this preservation effort, or it would not. I did have limited discussion with HP at the time towards this goal. Unfortunately communication suddenly stopped on their end and I later became busy with other priorities. So the work just collected dust.

Over the years I've been contacted by folks curious of the state of this work. Most recently someone interested to address the shortcomings in the 15C LE firmware -- essentially doing a port of KEMU to the AT91SAM7L128 based Voyager, which should be fairly straightforward. However we're back to the same issue of firmware disposition.

I've lost track of the HP contacts I'd been talking with, and by this time they may well have changed. So if this message is reaching the corporate ears of HP, would you kindly contact me off-forum to discuss my concern? Otherwise if anyone can point me in a direction to re-establish a dialogue with the appropriate contacts in HP, it would be appreciated.

Thanks,

-john