Show HN: E-Ink Day Schedule

#1

Post by dh-g » Mon, Sep 25, 2023, 12:31 PM UTC

Show HN: E-Ink Day Schedule
github.com

Re: Show HN: E-Ink Day Schedule

#2

Post by artursapek » Mon, Sep 25, 2023, 12:48 PM UTC

Very cool. I’d been thinking about building something like this. Do you look at it every day? Seems really useful.

Re: Show HN: E-Ink Day Schedule

#3

Post by Neil44 » Mon, Sep 25, 2023, 12:55 PM UTC

That's cool. I regret throwing my ancient kindle away now.

The expensive corporate version of this is called a Joan - https://getjoan.com/digital-signage/

Re: Show HN: E-Ink Day Schedule

#4

Post by gregoryl » Mon, Sep 25, 2023, 1:06 PM UTC

Neil44 wrote: post #3

That's cool. I regret throwing my ancient kindle away now. The expensive corporate version of this is called a Joan - https://getjoan.com/digital-signage/

Ooft. 900 euro and a subscription.

Re: Show HN: E-Ink Day Schedule

#5

Post by michaelbuckbee » Mon, Sep 25, 2023, 1:09 PM UTC

I use a Kindle Fire (non E-ink) tablet as a dedicated calendar viewing tool as:

1. It's very easy to put it into developer mode and set "don't lock screen if plugged in"

2. I can just open it to a web page of my calendar.

This is great as I don't get nerd-sniped into some dev project trying to set it all up and actually get a functional calendar so I don't miss things.

Re: Show HN: E-Ink Day Schedule

#6

Post by rmccue » Mon, Sep 25, 2023, 1:18 PM UTC

Neil44 wrote: post #3

That's cool. I regret throwing my ancient kindle away now. The expensive corporate version of this is called a Joan - https://getjoan.com/digital-signage/

A more affordable alternative to this is the Inkplate series, which uses recycled e-ink screens from tablets: https://soldered.com/categories/inkplate/

The software runs on an ESP32 and is all open source: https://inkplate.readthedocs.io/en/latest/

Re: Show HN: E-Ink Day Schedule

#7

Post by scottwick » Mon, Sep 25, 2023, 1:20 PM UTC

Does this use the battery? Not clear to me if the Kindle program is running continuously or if it just periodically starts up, refreshes the screen and then powers back down.

Re: Show HN: E-Ink Day Schedule

#8

Post by Waterluvian » Mon, Sep 25, 2023, 1:27 PM UTC

The crispness of e-ink is 99% of what makes me want it for semi-static displays. It’s just ridiculously satisfying to look at.

Re: Show HN: E-Ink Day Schedule

#9

Post by politelemon » Mon, Sep 25, 2023, 1:34 PM UTC

I repurpose all my old ereaders (Kindles and Kobos) into displays for something, weather, agendas, some even do images (albeit very low resolution). It's great to have these around the house, quietly doing their thing.

One thing I will point out from observation, the radios on ereader devices aren't great for heavy use; they were originally created for occasional syncing. Projects like these will require an HTTP request to somewhere to fetch data, on a regular basis, and the radio eventually stops working. It's not a terrible thing considering it's just an unused device. If you're looking for something longer lived, the waveshare screen are worth considering for mini projects.

Re: Show HN: E-Ink Day Schedule

#10

Post by afavour » Mon, Sep 25, 2023, 1:37 PM UTC

An aside but I’ve long thought that if Apple was truly committed to the environment and equipment reuse they’d let us use old iPads for stuff like this. I’d love to make a digital photo frame/day planner from an old iPad mini I have kicking around. They could even integrate Siri etc.

(I know you can get some way toward this with various apps but it’s definitely not the same as something OS-level)