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Show HN: Use an old tablet as an extra monitor

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Re: Show HN: Use an old tablet as an extra monitor

#61

Post by salawat »

-HTOP/Nethogs for system in question -Same for any intervening boxes -logs for middle boxes -web browser for reference lookups -window for manpages script noodling -window for debugging -vim -throw in some VM's and those hosts may need to be factored in -frigging email/chat/calendar clients if working with other people.

Yes, I can technically do all of those with one screen, and some screen/tmux magic. Fuck no, I do not want to. KVM can get you some ergo for mux'ing multiple boxes to a single screen. However, I'd much rather have multiple screens to partition my working set across.

Re: Show HN: Use an old tablet as an extra monitor

#62

Post by brainlessdev »

nunez wrote: post #33

I don't know how folks can use a ton of screens like this. I had four 32" monitors at one place and it was incredibly overwhelming. I've been rocking a single 27" screen for years. Even that's too big. I prefer 24" screens but it's difficult to get a good one. I can hold context in multiple virtual spaces, and key bindings make switching between them super quick. I guess this is in the same camp as "I don't understan…

Totally off-topic, but while reading this I was thinking "that is exactly what I would say". Then I saw your username... it looks like we share not only a taste for monitors but also a surname!

Re: Show HN: Use an old tablet as an extra monitor

#63

Post by myself248 »

Kerrick wrote: post #14
aaron695 wrote: post #7

Computers still only have three mainstream input devices, keyboard, mouse and gamepad after 60-80 years I'd try and bring the addition inputs a smart phone has to computers, like touch. I know there are programable keyboards and many other things. But no one has cracked it yet. It's a cool project as is. Just an idea if you were thinking of iterating forward.

I collect and use as many input devices as I can, as a bit of a hobby. It all started when I was younger and got a CueCat. Now I’m up to webcams, microphones, fingerprint sensors, many keyboards, mice, trackpads, trackballs, many game pads, MakeyMakey, a VR system, CharaChorder, MIDI keyboard, floor dance pad, Wacom tablet, BlackMagic keyboard with jog shuttle, and HOTaS. I’ve still got my eye on a macro pad, MIDI Fi…

Heyyy, CueCat club! Funny that QR codes are everywhere these days and people actually scan them; Digital Convergence was just ahead of their time.

I have keyboards with mag-stripe readers, keyboards with smart-card readers, keyboards with assignable and relegendable keys (meant for point-of-sale usage), 6DOF 3D "SpaceMouse" devices, a 5-axis Lexip Pu94 mouse, I've mapped an R/C quadcopter transmitter into a wireless joystick [1], and last year I finally bought my first USB gamepad. (To play Stray.)

I was recently digging into some details of the BlackMagic keyboard and it sounds like it's super difficult to remap the jog dial for other uses, what do you use yours for?

1: https://hackaday.io/page/11784-rc-transmitter-tx-as-a-virtua...

Re: Show HN: Use an old tablet as an extra monitor

#64

Post by switchbak »

nunez wrote: post #33

I don't know how folks can use a ton of screens like this. I had four 32" monitors at one place and it was incredibly overwhelming. I've been rocking a single 27" screen for years. Even that's too big. I prefer 24" screens but it's difficult to get a good one. I can hold context in multiple virtual spaces, and key bindings make switching between them super quick. I guess this is in the same camp as "I don't understan…

I think a lot of this depends on how you arrange your windows.

I've used a bunch of monitors in the past, but found that my neck started to hurt after looking to the side too much. And having the bezels right in the middle of your view makes the most valuable real estate effectively unusable (unless you have 3!). 4 32's would be way too much for me, no doubt.

Having a single widescreen monitor has been better for me. Most of the time I'm not maximizing its use, but when I want to combine a bunch of views at once, it's quite valuable. Like when I'm running a performance test while keeping tabs on a bunch of monitoring.

I think you're right that virtual workspaces are great, especially if you dedicate them for discrete purposes.

Re: Show HN: Use an old tablet as an extra monitor

#66

Post by skydhash »

Dries007 wrote: post #59
nunez wrote: post #33

I don't know how folks can use a ton of screens like this. I had four 32" monitors at one place and it was incredibly overwhelming. I've been rocking a single 27" screen for years. Even that's too big. I prefer 24" screens but it's difficult to get a good one. I can hold context in multiple virtual spaces, and key bindings make switching between them super quick. I guess this is in the same camp as "I don't understan…

What resolution & DPI is I think far more important than how many displays. I have 4. 1x 1440@27", 1x 1440@24" and 2x1080@24". If I had known 1440@24" would die out, I would have bought 3 of those instead. For me the ideal would be a 16:10 24" screen with the same density as the 1440 16:9 models. It's the perfect size & resolution for desktop use in programming / engineering. I'd buy 3 of those, but they don't exist…

LG has 4k 24 inch monitors. The DPI is amazing (not so much for color fidelity).

Re: Show HN: Use an old tablet as an extra monitor

#69

Post by guraf »

roessland wrote: post #4
jchanimal wrote: post #3

I love the suggestion to rebuild it for the browser. A tool like that could be generally useful. Anyone know of one?

tmux + ttyd (or gotty) could be used in a similar way. But it's not like an extra screen, it's more like mirroring a terminal to another device.

Someone asks for a webpage and not only do you propose tmux, you also acknowledge it doesn't even do anything like what's asked.

Typical Linux user.

Re: Show HN: Use an old tablet as an extra monitor

#70

Post by lexlash »

jrm4 wrote: post #22

Love this sort of hackery, but also -- it just kind of shows how very goofy all the limitations we have on this are. If you go with the idea that a computer should be a general purpose machine -- we have so many things that aren't computers. "Wireless external monitor" should be a trivially easy built-in to all operating systems, and that it isn't is kind of ridiculous.

RIP to FireWire target disk mode for Apple laptops and target display mode for iMacs.

The new docs promote AirPlay screen mirroring and networked shares over usb-c but it’s nowhere near the same. :/

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