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MomBoard: E-ink display for a parent with amnesia

jan.miksovsky.com

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Re: MomBoard: E-ink display for a parent with amnesia

#121

Post by lilyball »

ryanckulp wrote: post #46
pbronez wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is super cool! I might need to build one of those. My family needs a way to keep the fridge calendar up to date with our digital calendar.

for your family cal, check out TRMNL. can go on a fridge w/ magnets: https://usetrmnl.com (disclaimer, i'm the founder)

My fridge isn't magnetic. A lot of modern fridges aren't.

Might be a neat idea to offer a magnetic mount for it, like a flexible flat magnetic board shaped to fit the TRMNL with a sticky backing so you can attach it somewhere and then use that to attach the TRMNL (your site doesn't seem to say anything about being magnetic so I'm guessing you have to attach magnets to the TRMNL too though?).

For that matter, the site doesn't offer any information about mounting it at all. Looking at the disassembly animation I see what looks like a hole to hang it on a nail, but it might be nice to put this info at least in the FAQ section if nowhere else (that does say it can be "hung on a wall" but no details).

Re: MomBoard: E-ink display for a parent with amnesia

#122

Post by vitorbaptistaa »

I love these kinds of projects. Congratulations to the OP.

Unrelated, but does anyone know a good TV remote for elders? I'd like something like a Stream Deck with big buttons for things like :

* Turn it on/off

* Switch to TV channel 315

* Switch to TV channel 517

* Play Planet Earth on Netflix

* Play Young Sheldon on Netflix

My grandparents are 92 and 97 and even big remotes aren't cutting it. Not only that, but I'd like for them to be able to use ondemand video platforms, not only random TV channels.

To control the TV itself, it seems a RPi or ESP32 with an IR led is enough, but to put something to play on Netflix is surprisingly difficult. I'm able to control a Fire Stick using remote adb commands, but not sure how reliable it is. I'd love to find something like this off the shelf.

Technology is great, but it's not made for elders. It frustrates them (and me), and they end up feeling stupid, which angers me.

I am sure someone else must have done this, but I couldn't find it anywhere.

Re: MomBoard: E-ink display for a parent with amnesia

#123

Post by smeej »

frereubu wrote: post #13
smeej wrote: post #6

Understanding that the condition is rare enough that most of us really don't have a need to prepare for it, I wonder if there are any habits one could cultivate that would make it easier to live with amnesia. Learning new things is my favorite past time and strongest coping mechanism, so the though of not being able to do that anymore is up there with locked-in syndrome on my list of greatest living fears. For exampl…

If I'm right that this condition is like that of Henry Molaison - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Molaison - then the real difficulty is that you don't remember that you have amnesia.

Well yes, but my current "write down the details of my calls and refer back to them every time" wouldn't require me to remember I had amnesia, right? For now, I do remember those past conversations, but if I stopped remembering them, having them up on my screen in the side panel of my note-taking app would still make them available to me if I didn't.

That's the kind of idea I'm looking for.

Re: MomBoard: E-ink display for a parent with amnesia

#124

Post by smeej »

aDyslecticCrow wrote: post #15
smeej wrote: post #6

Understanding that the condition is rare enough that most of us really don't have a need to prepare for it, I wonder if there are any habits one could cultivate that would make it easier to live with amnesia. Learning new things is my favorite past time and strongest coping mechanism, so the though of not being able to do that anymore is up there with locked-in syndrome on my list of greatest living fears. For exampl…

Sign language and brail come to mind as useful in this regard (if not for you, then for a loved one). As for amnesia, it seems like a habit of making notes and seeking out to read your own notes would be useful. However, the trend in technology to constantly change behaviour, appearance, and functionality makes anything digital a barrier. Manual notes are also susceptible to being impossible for ageing people to make…

In what ways would sign language and Braille be helpful? Just to have them at the ready in case I were to lose my ability to hear/see?

Re: MomBoard: E-ink display for a parent with amnesia

#125

Post by Loughla »

vitorbaptistaa wrote: post #122

I love these kinds of projects. Congratulations to the OP. Unrelated, but does anyone know a good TV remote for elders? I'd like something like a Stream Deck with big buttons for things like : * Turn it on/off * Switch to TV channel 315 * Switch to TV channel 517 * Play Planet Earth on Netflix * Play Young Sheldon on Netflix My grandparents are 92 and 97 and even big remotes aren't cutting it. Not only that, but I'd…

I would like to second this. I tried a number of options with my grandpa and they always failed for one reason or another.

If anyone has a solution in this space, I would be very interested.

Re: MomBoard: E-ink display for a parent with amnesia

#126

Post by furyofantares »

frereubu wrote: post #12

This is one of the few HN articles that have profoundly moved me. Such a beautiful and simple use of technology to make a clear and big improvement in someone's life. As a side note on his mother remembering that the tablet exists, it sounds like she has amnesia quite like Henry Molaison, a famous case study in neuropathology. He had very specific brain damage that seemingly stopped him forming new memories in the sa…

> but studies showed that he could remember some things, just not consciously

I expect it is very hard to overestimate how incorrect our mental model memory and learning is. If literally everything was forgotten, then you could set up a reverse groundhog day or groundhog hour for someone, just optimize for them having a wonderful day every day. (Would still be horrible for the loved ones to be effectively disconnected from their still-living relative.) Probably there have been movies made about this.

I have no experience with this but I am sure it is nothing, nothing, nothing like that. The article says you wouldn't wish it on your worst enemy.

> Because she cannot remember things, she goes through each day in a state of low-grade anxiety about where her grown children are and whether they are all right. She feels she hasn’t heard from any of us in a long time.

To me this is not a description of someone frozen in time. To me this is a description of some horrific combination of some amount of learning or "remembering" happening, some sense of passage of time, and no episodic memories to draw on to explain any of it.

Re: MomBoard: E-ink display for a parent with amnesia

#127

Post by observationist »

It might be worthwhile to look at how an LLM might assist someone with this condition. A lot of the persistence hacks used on LLM chatbots are addressing the lack of retained memories outside of the context window, so maybe something like RAG could help your mom live a less limited life, or reduce some of the burden on you or other caretakers.

Brilliant use of tech, I'm happy when I see someone turn their nerd-powers to things that unabashedly make life better. Good work!

Re: MomBoard: E-ink display for a parent with amnesia

#128

Post by zamadatix »

vitorbaptistaa wrote: post #122

I love these kinds of projects. Congratulations to the OP. Unrelated, but does anyone know a good TV remote for elders? I'd like something like a Stream Deck with big buttons for things like : * Turn it on/off * Switch to TV channel 315 * Switch to TV channel 517 * Play Planet Earth on Netflix * Play Young Sheldon on Netflix My grandparents are 92 and 97 and even big remotes aren't cutting it. Not only that, but I'd…

Is their problem the size (big buttons) or the UI complexity the buttons control (trying to navigate on Netflix is a PITA compared to hitting a preset channel button)?

On the former I had luck with one of those jumbo remotes that just has a few buttons (channel up/down, volume up/down, power, mute) and separately programming the TV to only have the channels they cared about in the list. When it came to smart apps it just became impossible to try to fix via the remote as the remote wasn't really the problem.

Re: MomBoard: E-ink display for a parent with amnesia

#129

Post by asddubs »

bravura wrote: post #93
rosslh wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your comment is some interesting food for thought, but I wanted to respond to a couple statements you made: > not being able to center text no matter how much frontend experience we have Not being able to center things is a bit of a meme, but flexbox was introduced back in 2009 and has been supported by major browsers for quite a long time. Centering text and elements is now extremely easy. > css could benefit from k…

As someone who has struggled with getting CSS to do normal layout stuff that had clear precise semantics but required weird CSS trickery, it's actually more scary than lucky that stuff like container queries have arrived 30 years after CSS was introduced. I agree with GP that CSS should be scrapped.

container queries have a very obvious chicken and egg problem if used a certain way: If this container is less than 30px wide, make its content 60px wide. Otherwise make it 20px wide. Now that container exists in a quantum state of being both 30 and 60px wide. I actually haven't looked into container queries to see how they ended up dealing with this yet.

Obviously this is a very contrived example but it can also express itself in subtler ways.

Re: MomBoard: E-ink display for a parent with amnesia

#130

Post by bolasanibk »

furyofantares wrote: post #126
frereubu wrote: post #12

This is one of the few HN articles that have profoundly moved me. Such a beautiful and simple use of technology to make a clear and big improvement in someone's life. As a side note on his mother remembering that the tablet exists, it sounds like she has amnesia quite like Henry Molaison, a famous case study in neuropathology. He had very specific brain damage that seemingly stopped him forming new memories in the sa…

> but studies showed that he could remember some things, just not consciously I expect it is very hard to overestimate how incorrect our mental model memory and learning is. If literally everything was forgotten, then you could set up a reverse groundhog day or groundhog hour for someone, just optimize for them having a wonderful day every day. (Would still be horrible for the loved ones to be effectively disconnecte…

> If literally everything was forgotten, then you could set up a reverse groundhog day or groundhog hour for someone, just optimize for them having a wonderful day every day. (Would still be horrible for the loved ones to be effectively disconnected from their still-living relative.) Probably there have been movies made about this.

There is a Drew Barrymore movie Fifty first dates. And yes, it is horrible for the relatives.

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