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I built a receipt printer for GitHub issues

aschmelyun.com

111–120 of 178 posts

Re: I built a receipt printer for GitHub issues

#111

This is a fun idea, but I've read thermal paper is surprisingly nasty stuff. [Edit: unless it's advertised as "phenol-free".] It's not just paper. It contains plastics (BPA or BPS) that you absorb through your skin when handling it. I'd avoid working with receipts at my desk all day. (I'd also avoid being a grocery store cashier...) https://www.pca.state.mn.us/green-chemistry/bpa-thermal-pape...

As a retail worker of 6 yrs I’m raising my eye at this…

Re: I built a receipt printer for GitHub issues

#112
post #67

You should get a camera and write an OCR scanner that automatically scans the receipts as they are printed, then pushes it into a DB so you can view all your issues via a simple web application, replete with tracking, reminders, and then an e-mail integration that e-mails the opener of the issue when you put a comment on the receipt that's printed and rescanned.

This reminds me of a comment I read a long time ago about somebody's experience working for a company that had a branch in Japan. They would demand that some spreadsheets be sent as a fax, and then some employee would be tasked with re-typing all that information back into a spreadsheet later on.

I once had a cube next to mine. It was the “Japan Cube”, all it had was a printer and a fax machine.

It was only ever used for faxes to and from Japan.

Eventually it was decorated with Japanese art and etc.

Re: I built a receipt printer for GitHub issues

#113
post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s the reason behind the inches vs millimeters distinction? I understand it’s just a heuristic but I don’t get what the underlying cause is.

english == Made in America; Quality. metric == Chinese; Piece of crap is the intention I think. Not a fair distinction imho, but to each their own.

I am buying these off eBay in the United States. English units might mean "culturally sensitive" which is a tracer for quality.

A Zebra or NCR sold in the US will be marketed with English units, the same printer is probably marketed in the E.U. with metric units.

The people selling the off brand printer might not know or could care less what units are used in the area it is being marketed in, which is a tracer for them not caring about any other quality attributes of the product.

Re: I built a receipt printer for GitHub issues

#115

This is a fun idea, but I've read thermal paper is surprisingly nasty stuff. [Edit: unless it's advertised as "phenol-free".] It's not just paper. It contains plastics (BPA or BPS) that you absorb through your skin when handling it. I'd avoid working with receipts at my desk all day. (I'd also avoid being a grocery store cashier...) https://www.pca.state.mn.us/green-chemistry/bpa-thermal-pape...

Why do they use thermal printing for receipts? Is it just cheaper because you don't have ink that runs out? Less moving parts so less maintenance?

Pros: faster, quieter, better quality, don't need to know how to load ribbon when it runs out.

Cons: fancy paper, fades over time, destroyed by even minor heat.

We switched from dot matrix receipts to thermal a few years ago and there were several very vocal complaints about the relative impermanence of a thermal receipt.

Re: I built a receipt printer for GitHub issues

#116
post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We would have a lot of cancer victims who happen to be cashiers in that case?

I found this in two minutes: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29778011/

Interesting but that is n=54 and for a specific geomarket (common supply chain).

Re: I built a receipt printer for GitHub issues

#118

This is a really funny read for a Friday morning. It should play an MP3 of a line cook in a busy diner shouting, "Order up!", and then he can stick it on a rotating order wheel hanging above his desk. EDIT: One of these things: https://www.webstaurantstore.com/choice-stainless-steel-orde...

A friend shared this, and my response then was that the author should go tell his plan to a line cook and see what response he gets :P For those who haven't been around kitchen culture, it's common to joke about having nightmares about the sound of the ticket printer.

Is the sound objectionable or do you mean that it triggers a conditioned response?

Re: I built a receipt printer for GitHub issues

#120
post #67

You should get a camera and write an OCR scanner that automatically scans the receipts as they are printed, then pushes it into a DB so you can view all your issues via a simple web application, replete with tracking, reminders, and then an e-mail integration that e-mails the opener of the issue when you put a comment on the receipt that's printed and rescanned.

This reminds me of a comment I read a long time ago about somebody's experience working for a company that had a branch in Japan. They would demand that some spreadsheets be sent as a fax, and then some employee would be tasked with re-typing all that information back into a spreadsheet later on.

I once worked at a job where one of the owners of the company, when asked to send a pdf copy of a document, would print out the document on the shared office copier/printer, then scan it back in using the same copier/printer and have it email him the pdf. Every single time he ever made a pdf of any file, even hundreds of pages, he would do this way.
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