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ReMarkable tablet open source tools and hacks

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221–230 of 257 posts

Re: ReMarkable tablet open source tools and hacks

#221
The remarkable is more open than usual and that's great. That being said, if your priorities are openness, you should look at Onyx or Likebook devices, they run android and you can root them. That alone is leagues above anything in the Remarkable.

They are cheaper with better screens and more powerful processors, too.

Re: ReMarkable tablet open source tools and hacks

#222
post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are none of the other eBook readers "hackable", and/or running a mostly-plain-vanilla Linux distribution?

Well the reMarkable isn't an eBook reader. That is something it can do, but it's more aimed at note taking. You also have root access out of box, which is not something that eBook readers give you.

A lot of eReaders nowadays have Wacom touchscreens, run android, and have an unlocked bootloader.

Unless you limit yourself to mainstream Western eReaders, it's not really the case anymore.

Re: ReMarkable tablet open source tools and hacks

#223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve been happy with my Boox Nova 2, which is smaller and more portable. It’s an Android tablet so you can enable developer options.

The Boox devices are pretty nice. The Note Air is a bit larger and close to the reMarkable 2 in form factor.

+1 on Note Air. Cancelled rM2 because of no browser and Android support in Boox.

Was a good decision.

Re: ReMarkable tablet open source tools and hacks

#224

What really matters is not how "open" the device is, but the open-ness of its data format, which is where rM epically fails. It doesn't matter if a gadget is hackable if it locks you into a proprietary file format and doesn't have good interoperability. Exporting PDFs just doesn't cut it; the point of keeping your notes digital is being able to (a) maintain them as living documents and (b) use them on hardware of you…

Might be different for different people but I sure prefer a "open device using a proprietary file format" over "proprietary device using a open file format" as the former allows me to change everything regarding the device, even what file format it uses. So I can continue using the proprietary file format or change it to a open one with a different reader/writer, but same hardware.

"proprietary device using open file format" would make me be stuck with whatever format they decided to use, and stuck with the same reader/writer. This is less helpful to me than being able to change everything in the device.

Re: ReMarkable tablet open source tools and hacks

#225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are pretty hacker firendly, but it's always good to show that this is something that people like

Just saying on the website or somewhere else officially that being able to ssh in is a feature and not something they just left there and may remove later would make the device a lot more attractive.

It's not a accident that ssh is enabled. It is mentioned in official documentation (https://support.remarkable.com/hc/en-us/articles/36000266255...) and also part of their promise to be compliant with GPLv3. Would be weird if they suddenly decided it was OK to break GPL and remove ssh access. Not only would the people who bought it because it's so open (like me) try to return it, I'm sure bunch of people would try to sue them for removing features post-launch as well.

Re: ReMarkable tablet open source tools and hacks

#226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Opt-out analytics is not the only way to do research on your own products or users. Not by a lot. And it being popular doesn't justify it, it's just an invasion of privacy that many people put up with (or are unaware of).

I don't agree it's a 0 or 1 decision, you can gather analytics in a privacy-preserving way, see e.g. plausible.io [1] or similar implementations that track users without collecting personal data. [1] https://plausible.io/self-hosted-web-analytics

Looks like a great service. I hadn’t seen it before and the timing is perfect

Re: ReMarkable tablet open source tools and hacks

#227
post #187
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have very bad handwriting, especially when not taking care to write carefully, which when making notes, I don't. Here is an example on how it parses my terrible handwriting: https://websites.instantwebsite.app/wPhkwSStQvStUrzPC9jW5Kw/... (no, I'm not a doctor) According to the licenses on the device, the handwriting is "partially powered by MyScript" which seems to be this service: https://www.myscript.com/

I had band handwriting and spent some time with Write Now! which is a book teaching the Getty-Dubay italics method to adults. It helped quite a bit, but I’ve been meaning to revisit it and I think it would be great to pull PDFs into something like ReMarkable for practice. https://handwritingsuccess.com/ Edit: looks like they have released an iPad app since I last tried it! I’ll also add that when I first did it I fou…

What a great way of telling someone their handwriting is terrible without saying it outright, and also give advice on how to improve it! :)

Jokes aside, practice PDFs for improving my handwriting does sound interesting, thank you for taking the time to share it.

Re: ReMarkable tablet open source tools and hacks

#228

What really matters is not how "open" the device is, but the open-ness of its data format, which is where rM epically fails. It doesn't matter if a gadget is hackable if it locks you into a proprietary file format and doesn't have good interoperability. Exporting PDFs just doesn't cut it; the point of keeping your notes digital is being able to (a) maintain them as living documents and (b) use them on hardware of you…

The notebook storage format is well understood, now. There are multiple libraries for parsing/exporting/syncing.

Re: ReMarkable tablet open source tools and hacks

#230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Majority of consumer facing products collect usage analytics, otherwise they don’t know how to improve the product.

I usually use two squares of toilet paper per wipe. Occasionally I’ll use three, sometimes accidentally and sometimes because I need three. Whenever I use three I wonder to myself how that will appear when the numbers are crunched. Then I remember there’s no analytics for my toilet paper.

  > Then I remember there’s no analytics for my toilet paper.
Apparently there are, but they are self-hosted and on a real-time multitasking system.
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