This is not quite clear in my mind.

A zero insertion force socket allows pins to be pushed into sockets on a circuit board without damaging the chip. You open the holes by pushing a lever, drop the pins in and secure them by using the lever again to close the holes.

A precursor to the zip fastener consisted of longer stiff rectangles which were pressed together, rather like those used to close ziplock bags.

I suggest a combination of the two as a fastener. There is a row of rigid clips on one edge and a row of flat rectangles on the other. Each can match to any of each of the others, so they need not be lined up exactly. At one end is a lever, linking up down the row of clips, so that all that is needed to close and open the fastener is to line up the edges and push the lever one way or the other.

This would work fine on a belt, or a series of them would work if operated separately if enabling communication between the clips turns out to be too hard.
-- nineteenthly, Aug 18 2008

As you note, the fastening portion would have to be rigid. I don't think this would work well for clothing in general as there are too many parts to fail.
-- phoenix, Aug 18 2008


Now try doing up your zip after six beers.
-- wagster, Aug 18 2008


[Phoenix], that is a potential flaw, but with a zip(per) there are several hundred parts to fail, and they don't generally. There are at least two approaches to this. One is to have a single lever and all the others joined to that one lever. Another is to have one lever per clasp, which could be a very small number, maybe just three. A third is to combine the two, and use the first method until it fails, then the second.
-- nineteenthly, Aug 18 2008


// try doing up your zip after six beers. //

OOOOOOWWWWWAAA hhhhhhheeeehhhiiihhhaaaa ...

<whimpering>
-- 8th of 7, Aug 18 2008



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