Purpose

The language.
As you can read, my native language is not English. Sorry for the English natives, but your language is the only other one I know a bit, and it is understood all over the world. Hopefully.
The aim
is to bring people and information to one place, together we are very strong and can solve any problem. I have tried this on a forum, but there you have always at least one person destroying any effort.
Your support.
Please use the comment button and tell me what you know (in English or German), what link you know about either English or German pages. Actually it is not a button, but the written word "comments" at the end of each entry. Alternately, if you prefer you can send me an eMail, use the address given on this page, up and to the right.

My role.
Trying to document and coordinate.
What kind of people - some know technical details, some know practical use, some know howto....
One solution, two marketing methods:
The solution can look similar to the "Polaroid with Braun-Flash" as shown here, the (marketing-)method can be either standard route by manufacturing/dealer or by DIY not excluding the kitchen table, or a combination of both.
Possible scenario.
You are taking pictures with your NEX at a marriage, you need to use the flash, and you are not the only person taking photos. That's just to prevent you from telling some of the many workarounds which are flooding the net, and are of no help in this case. One possible workaround is to encapsulate the existing flash with a slave sensor, this works on an experimental level, the reliability too low.

Status of knowledge to me:
I'm willing to learn that I'm wrong, when I get corrected. The following is not my invention but what I read on the internet.
The firmware has not been disassembled till now, there are no third party firmware modifications available.
Every solution needs to be based purely on hardware.
Beside the offerings from NEX, there is no third party solution available.
Currently there are two versions of a flash available for the NEX cameras:
HVL-F7S   Standard with the NEX
HVL-F20S  Additional Option
The guidenumbers are a bit misleading, but this is not my subject here. Both need to be mounted directly to the camera, fastened by a thumb screw with a thread of standard M2.5 (x 0.45, or 3-56 ISO), contact is made by a proprietary tiny 14pin connector. Logical ground is on pin 4 and 12, pin 5 is the "SYNC" signal, coming directly from the CPU, and needs to be amplified before representing F1.
Sony uses Rohm 2SC4505T100 (400V, 0.1A), SYNC>R10k>Base, Base>R47k>LGND, Emitter>LGND and Collector>F1.
Processor: Toshiba TMP19A44FDAXBG. According to Toshiba:
The TX19 is a family of Toshiba-original 32-bit RISC processors featuring the speed of MIPS32ISA with the added advantage of a significantly reduced code size of the MIPS16eISA.
Source Code: Sony Global - Source Code Distribution Service

My idea is to modify the little HVL-F7S to change its behavier (controllable by a switch if possible) to
   emitting no light
   Faster repeat cycle
   providing a PC-output connector
   good luck!