Adventures in USB OTG

One of the greatest feature of “certain” Android devices is the ability to connect to USB devices via OTG (On-the-Go). Your phone or tablet is no longer the device but the host. You have the ability to connect USB drives as mass storage or the ability to plug in a mouse or keyboard.

For me, the coolest thing is the ability to use a phone or tablet as a vt100/hyperterminal/minicom terminal. For years, in data centers, I used a IBM Workpad Z50 (Windows CE) or a Windows laptop running hyperterm to connect to switches, routers, firewalls, UPS and the likes.

For less than $2 (Amazon Link )

you can get an OTG cable to work with your Android device.

I was able to successfully connect a Galaxy Nexus and a Galaxy Tab 2 7” (using a different 30-pin to OTG cable) to various switches and firewalls.

That was a geek epiphany moment