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MomBoard: E-ink display for a parent with amnesia

jan.miksovsky.com

201–210 of 259 posts

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

#201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but studies showed that he could remember some things, just not consciously. This reminds me of muscle memory. I can play pieces on the piano even though I don't actively remember the sheet music of them. My hands just "know" what to do. Funnily enough the moment I start actively thinking about certain passages that ability worsens by a lot.

Further than just muscle memory, every cell in our bodies actually has "memories". That's why heart transplant patients can experience personality changes from the donor: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S03069...

I remember seeing a docmentary about this. There was a man who received a transplant arm from someone who died and started to exhibit the donor's manners and ended up planning an elaborate scheme to get revenge on the donor's twin brother.

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

#203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The principal of my son’s former school was a Sister of St Joseph, and a huge HN fan. More amazing was how creative the sisters were in managing themselves with technology. Many decisions are made by votes, done in real time globally! Religious people get short shrift.

Reminds me of the monks in the third season of Babylon 5. Who says you can't both be an IT person and a cleric?

That episode with the reformed murderer was especially hard...what a brilliant show

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

#204
NB: As the article mentions concerns about burn-in, this doesn't seem to be an issue for e-ink devices.

Many ship with a standard image or set of images displayed when powered off or suspended. Presumably those display for long periods of time. My experience over ~3 years with a similar Onyx BOOX device has been that those images don't burn in at all.

What is experienced is temporary ghosting which varies by display mode (these can be set either globally or per application), when partial refreshes are made. The solution is to do a full refresh every so often, for which there are a number of built-in settings, or which can be triggered manually on the tablet.

For either the author here or others looking to implement similar projects, you can very likely safely skip any consideration of burn-in, though if your interest is in crystal-clear display, full refresh can be used. Particularly when display updates are infrequent, say, < 1/minute, or any longer period.

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

#205

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…

This matches my experience. Sadly the way tech has evolved has made a lot of entertainment totally unaccessible for a lot folks. It needn't be that way. Seniors would be happy to just have a button thst played a netflix title randomly, but somehow that is unattainable.

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

#208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but studies showed that he could remember some things, just not consciously. This reminds me of muscle memory. I can play pieces on the piano even though I don't actively remember the sheet music of them. My hands just "know" what to do. Funnily enough the moment I start actively thinking about certain passages that ability worsens by a lot.

It's exactly the same when solving Rubik's Cubes. At the start it's all about carrying around notes full of picking the relevant condition depending on the current permutation/state of the cube then following the step by step algorithms on which sequence of steps to perform for that condition. Then you'll naturally realise that certain conditions happen a lot more than others and you'll start to remember the sequence…

You'll also notice this if you try to significantly slow down performing an algorithm, or try to solve a digital Rubik's cube where you have to click and drag to rotate sides.

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

#209
post #3

What a beautiful use of technology to uphold someone's personhood, and let them know they are loved, despite (and with regard to) a profound injury. This reminds me of a desire I've had for a long time: a simple, wall-mountable eInk device that could be configured with a URL (+wifi creds) and render a markdown file, refreshing once every hour or so. It would be so useful for so many applications – I'm a parish priest…

If you're comfortable with microcontrollers (esp32/arduino), I can definitely recommend Inkplate. I found them when I was making a similar setup for my parents, and they have various sizes up to 10" and up to 6 colors they can display. You can either just get the module, or buy with a battery and mountable case already attached. I think all of the models are also available via Digikey and Mouser if people don't trust…

Seconded. I matted and framed one InkPlate 10 and hung it on our wall, then wrote a simple "show the next three days from everyone in the family's Google Calendars" image creation script and it's been wonderful.

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

#210
Some time ago I considered doing something similar for my parents. They're both fine, but since I live in another country, it could be a creative gift to send them messages on special occasions. I would use an e-ink display attached to an ESP8266 or similar though.
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