“Bluetooth® Smart Dongle”

(Shown with a U.S. quarter-dollar coin to indicate size.) This week I learned what a “dongle” is.
noun, Digital Technology.
1. A small device that plugs into a computer and serves as an adapter or as a security measure to enable the use of particular software
2. Also called wireless adapter. A device that can be plugged into a USB port to enable wireless access from a computer to an external Wi-Fi device, as a mobile phone, or to the Internet, via high-speed broadband, or to enable wireless connectivity in a printer or other peripheral.

In this case, the ½"×¾" dongle allows software on my laptop to communicate wirelessly with the “NK Speed Coach GPS” device that I received as a 60th birthday gift recently from a [very generous] friend. The Speed Coach is an electronic device that goes with me in the rowing shell; it:
• calculates my speed
• counts my strokes and
• maps my route.
It's the blue-wrapped "box" evident in yesterday's post, http://365project.org/rhoing/365/2016-09-06

First known use: 1981; probably an arbitrary coinage, but perhaps alteration of “dangle.”

1 year ago (“Hanging thief”): http://365project.org/rhoing/365/2015-09-07
2 years ago (“AMD Turion™ II Ultra”): http://365project.org/rhoing/365/2014-09-07
3 years ago (“Grace: second time out”): http://365project.org/rhoing/365/2013-09-07
4 years ago (“People…”): http://365project.org/rhoing/365/2012-09-07
5 years ago (“With a dash of desperation!”): http://365project.org/rhoing/365/2011-09-07

[ IMG_2648S10x10tm :: f/7.1 :: 1/200" :: ISO-800 :: 55mm :: folio ]

[Maggiemae]

I always thought a dongle was something else - a 'pencil' for the keyboard on a mobile phone, but I must be wrong. This is a dongle - dingle dingle dongle! Excuse me!

[Thom Mitchell]

@maggiemae I think the pencil "hardware" piece is a "stylus". (Sharp-ish, pointy object like we used to have on the arms of our record players and turntables to play records!)