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I built Timeframe, our family e-paper dashboard

hawksley.org

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Re: I built Timeframe, our family e-paper dashboard

#111

This is awesome but I still find it funny that he said he wants a healthy relationship with technology then goes and fits his entire house out with technology. It doesnt seem like any of this would really be useful as you'd have to enter all the useful data manually(calendar). For example the washing machine. You dont need real time information because you know how long it takes since you've done it 1000s of times an…

> All these things are just managed in our heads subconsciously.

That’s certainly true for some people, and I envy them. Others of us can easily forget the washing machine was on and needs emptying for anything up to three or four days, running it each day before promptly forgetting to empty it before it needs doing again.

Re: I built Timeframe, our family e-paper dashboard

#112
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eh, depends. If you have a dog, and live in a place with actual seasons, February requires frequently checking the current conditions before you head out—at least where we live, it could be anywhere from -10°C to +12°C right now, raining, snowing—annoying to put on a light jacket because you let the sun fool you, and discover it's freezing and starting to rain once you're on the field. That said: I seem to get by pre…

Still, isn't the forecast for one hour from now more useful than literally now? You can see that through the window (and feel it on your face by opening the window).

About the only thing about the weather I can tell from my window is whether it is currently raining or not.

The temperature inside is not at all indicative of the temperature outside, the sun being out doesn't mean it is warm, and I don't really have any useful indicators of wind, unless the windows are rattling, but that doesn't let me know if there's a stiff breeze.

I could walk over and open up my balcony door and experience it all personally, but checking my phone or watch is faster and more accurate, and also gives me the forecast at the same time.

Re: I built Timeframe, our family e-paper dashboard

#113
post #31
post #2

This is super cool, and I wish something like this existed at my place, as it enables information sharing without the need for phones/actual screens that shine in your face when the lights are low or tempt you to doomscroll. That said, the large primary display this uses is $2000. That's very hard to justify for any "normal" household, and that's without any mounts, backend, services etc.

I have a similar setup at home with a homemade dashboard. It's less polished and I've never implemented smart home (don't use any smart home devices) but it's calendar, weather, air quality and subway alerts. I also took the tack of building the UI with Bootstrap 3 so that it will run on any of my ancient devices like a gen 2 ipad air. I did it as much to usefully recycle old screens as anything else.

Home assistant is great even if you don't have devices. It can get data from all you calendars weather and such.

Re: I built Timeframe, our family e-paper dashboard

#114

~3000€ to show information in some random places in the house even though the household members have a device with a screen called a smartphone next to them 24/7 ? Well, it's cool, but the usability of it all is below average. Declutter your life and don't install any more screens in your home ;)

It's a hobby but not for everyone. I mean if I could just throw away 3,000€ on random projects that might work or not I'd do it in a heartbeat. No different than buying a run down Porsche for 5,000€ and spending 40,000€ on restoration to original. Every hobby is like that but with different entry price points. There is a reason knitting is more popular than something like this (and even that has price tiers from 3€ f…

As someone whose spouse knits, it gave me a chuckle to see knitting mentioned as a low-cost hobby :)

Re: I built Timeframe, our family e-paper dashboard

#115
post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it's ableist to ignore the fact that many people _do_ have such issues, and many people don't but start having problems as they age.

It’s also offensive to only think older people have these problems. Have any of you considered race or sex or gender when talking about these issues? It’s really offensive not to include all these other categories. Maybe certain genders have this problem or maybe I enjoy getting offended by everything.

As far as I can tell any gender issues is just culture lets some people become helpless when they could. Meanwhile many people lose cognitive functionias they get old. Thus elderly is a safe fact while any other gender reference is citation needed.

Re: I built Timeframe, our family e-paper dashboard

#116
I really like epaper displays for all of the reasons mentioned in the article. Shame the patent locks continue to keep prices high even though the core technology has improved enough for prices to drop.

A few years ago I came into a couple of e-ink displays that had been previously used for storefront/product pricing. The hardware to drive them was locked down but I was able to reverse engineer the panel by finding a datasheet that was close enough and hacking up an adafruit thinkink. I had a lot of fun writing my own driver/abstraction layer. I originally intended to support a bunch of different panels but ran out of steam after the first one did exactly what I wanted.

https://github.com/jaygreco/MagInkCal

Re: I built Timeframe, our family e-paper dashboard

#117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OP's Timeframe looks rad, but yes on the pricy side. check out trmnl .com for smaller / less expensive options and self hosted options. (disclaimer: i'm on the team)

I’m a big fan of TRMNL! The big difference with the Boox device is real-time updates, which make the smart home status information much more useful.

thanks for the support and i hear you. a few folks pointed their Boox at TRMNL[1], and we’re finally in the smart home arena now with free 5 min refresh rate for Home Assistant. aiming for JIT refresh by summer.

1. https://www.reddit.com/r/Onyx_Boox/s/ZSLF7u5pm8

Re: I built Timeframe, our family e-paper dashboard

#118
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eh, depends. If you have a dog, and live in a place with actual seasons, February requires frequently checking the current conditions before you head out—at least where we live, it could be anywhere from -10°C to +12°C right now, raining, snowing—annoying to put on a light jacket because you let the sun fool you, and discover it's freezing and starting to rain once you're on the field. That said: I seem to get by pre…

Still, isn't the forecast for one hour from now more useful than literally now? You can see that through the window (and feel it on your face by opening the window).

Not really - it might not be raining where I am but rain is in the area and it will cross where I walk.

Re: I built Timeframe, our family e-paper dashboard

#119
post #14
post #6

I’m always surprised how much people seem to want to constantly know the weather.

Same. You can always tell how is going to be the weather by yourself. Depending on how much time have you lived in the same place you can predict the weather for the day when you get up or, if you are a completely stranger to the environment, at least half an hour before.

Outside my house right now it’s a cold, still evening with a high overcast. My expectation based on my years of experience living here and having seen these conditions before would be that it would likely clear out overnight, freeze hard, and be a beautiful day tomorrow.

In fact, though, a massive bomb cyclone is forming a few hundred miles away and it’s likely to dump over a foot of snow on us in the next 24 hours, accompanied by 50mph winds.

Weather forecasts are, not surprisingly, actually useful.

Re: I built Timeframe, our family e-paper dashboard

#120
post #6

I’m always surprised how much people seem to want to constantly know the weather.

Agreed. Especially the current weather conditions. That's mostly useless info. Knowing the weather forecast for tomorrow or this weekend is actually useful. It's strange that pretty much every weather widget assumes you want to know the current weather conditions and not the forecast.

> Especially the current weather conditions. That's mostly useless info

Do you... not go outside? And not need to know if you need the heavy coat, light coat, light waterproof coat, and/or umbrella? Or pants vs shorts? And the answers are very different at 7am vs 11am vs 3pm?

I'm not trying to be sarcastic, I'm just genuinely baffled.

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