Cars made after 1996 (and some before that) have a port for OBD-2 (an emissions control regime) diagnostics. This is located usually below the dashboard. There are many products that can be plugged into this port, that can read real-time data about the car's operation, such as fuel consumption rate, various temperatures, rpms, voltages, etc. One of these is just a box that displays instantaneous data and stores some history, allowing it to act as a trip computer. Others, for those who are data hungry, consist of a connector that plugs into the port one one end and into a notebook or PDA at the other; and software that shows readouts, charts, etc. of the hundreds of vehicle parameters. The connection is either serial or USB.
Now there is some free software for Linux also that does the same thing. So I'm thinking that a Z would make a great host and output device. Would there be a way to do real-time data acquisition through a serial or USB connection? IF so, then we can get at least textual information stored, and finding or writing software to do chart displays would be next.
An easy alternative is to get an older Palm and the appropriate product (some of those available support Palm already), at a cost of around $300 total. But it'd be great if the Z could be used. Any/all thoughts appreciated.
