A Raspberry Pi-powered live train station sign • Hacker News Board

Re: A Raspberry Pi-powered live train station sign

#41

Post by tombert » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 4:57 PM UTC

Avamander wrote: post #26

vasco wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, it is also overkill to learn how to program and deal with an ESP32 if you already know some light linux sysadmining and some high level programming language to set this up.

ESP32 can run μPython which should make it quite a bit easier for those that know some high level programming language. For me using an ESP32 seems like the more reliable, secure, easier and faster solution but people have their preferences and I relate to it being a bit scary at first.

A restricted port of a language isn't the same thing as the full language. On a Raspberry Pi, you have access to POSIX, system libraries, filesystems, package managers, etc...

μPython is fine, but typically a programming language is about more than just the language.

Re: A Raspberry Pi-powered live train station sign

#42

Post by inflatableDodo » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 4:58 PM UTC

I like the emergence of these cheap, fun, single function computing devices. Sure, it is useful to have a smartphone that does everything, but that doesn't help develop your internal map of reality in the same way as things like this do.

Ubuiquity can only be stretched so far in a single tool before the benefit you derive from adding yet another feature is outweighed by it becoming very slightly worse at everything else it does. Smartphones are great, but as a backup computing device, in much the same way keyring multitools are. And the best of them are still measurably worse than the best non-smartphones at actually being mobile phones.

Re: A Raspberry Pi-powered live train station sign

#43

Post by GordonS » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 5:00 PM UTC

As a total PI noob, it's great to see such clear and simple to follow instructions for something actually practical. Also liked the specific recommendations for the case and such - it would be really easy for someone to replicate.

Been meaning to get a PI and do something with it for years!

Re: A Raspberry Pi-powered live train station sign

#44

Post by pndy » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 5:04 PM UTC

This is great!

And it made me wonder if bus transport data in my city is available for everyone - we got few displays around, two services/applications that show the current position for each line...

Re: A Raspberry Pi-powered live train station sign

#45

Post by lol768 » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 5:04 PM UTC

sparso wrote: post #21

https://ukdepartureboards.co.uk/store/

Given these start at £150, I know which route I'd rather take.

Re: A Raspberry Pi-powered live train station sign

#46

Post by tacLog » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 5:05 PM UTC

alexandros wrote: post #18

Hey folks, balena.io founder here, just chiming in to mention that Chris is one of our Hardware Hackers in Residence, and if you think that doing HW projects with all sorts of cool technologies and writing them up for the world is your dream job, we're hiring! https://balena.workable.com/j/27A101659C Happy to answer any balena (or train station sign) related questions, of course :)

Hey I just had a quick question.

I have been looking at building a project on Balena OS and raspberry pi 0 W. I want to deploy it in a hard to get to place and don't want to have to replace the SD card for a good amount of time.

I was wondering if Balena OS with Balena cloud managing it puts more or less strain the the sd card write cycles than Raspbian.

Chris's application seems to write little or nothing to the sd card so in your experience how would it last? A couple years?

Re: A Raspberry Pi-powered live train station sign

#47

Post by OrgNet » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 5:07 PM UTC

GordonS wrote: post #43

As a total PI noob, it's great to see such clear and simple to follow instructions for something actually practical. Also liked the specific recommendations for the case and such - it would be really easy for someone to replicate. Been meaning to get a PI and do something with it for years!

there's a phone right next to it that could do the same thing

Re: A Raspberry Pi-powered live train station sign

#48

Post by kevan » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 5:07 PM UTC

Pretty cool. When I took the train to work I made a simple stop-light with transit data. Trains ran every 10 minutes and it took me a few minutes to walk to the station. Green meant I could definitely catch the next train. Yellow meant I'd make it if I walked fast, and red meant I'd miss this train and need to wait for the next one.

Re: A Raspberry Pi-powered live train station sign

#49

Post by alexandros » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 5:14 PM UTC

tacLog wrote: post #46

alexandros wrote: post #18

Hey folks, balena.io founder here, just chiming in to mention that Chris is one of our Hardware Hackers in Residence, and if you think that doing HW projects with all sorts of cool technologies and writing them up for the world is your dream job, we're hiring! https://balena.workable.com/j/27A101659C Happy to answer any balena (or train station sign) related questions, of course :)

Hey I just had a quick question. I have been looking at building a project on Balena OS and raspberry pi 0 W. I want to deploy it in a hard to get to place and don't want to have to replace the SD card for a good amount of time. I was wondering if Balena OS with Balena cloud managing it puts more or less strain the the sd card write cycles than Raspbian. Chris's application seems to write little or nothing to the sd…

Hey, balenaOS has been designed for long term deployment. As such, we have a read-only partition for the hostOS. We also have a second host partition so we can update the OS remotely and atomically. In general, we've tuned all sorts of elements in this direction as our customers really don't want to run around collecting sd cards from all over the world.

Re: A Raspberry Pi-powered live train station sign

#50

Post by fapjacks » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 5:23 PM UTC

dwyerm wrote: post #5

duxup wrote: post #2

That is super cool. But admittedly when I saw the title i was hoping for a mini version of those massive flipboard signs. Those things are amazing.

A Solari Split-Flap Display? I love that they're making new ones! Starbucks has been putting them in their Reserve Roasteries. I'm also sort of happy with the 'modern' ones that are actually LCD screens with speakers making the noises. It's cheating, but it's a nice tribute.

There is something to be said for these kinds of vestigial remnants of technologies past. I've always been fascinated by them, and in fact this kind of thing in computer folklore -- for example parts of the docs that explain something exists "for historical reasons" -- are one of the things that got me into programming. For example the "size_t" size has pretty funny origins which I'll leave as an exercise to the reader. But this kind of thing also has a linguistic component which is also equally fascinating to me. For example how we still "dial" a phone, which then "rings" for the person being "called".