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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

#251

Post by mailund »

spiralcoaster wrote: post #203
Exoristos wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Strong correlation with those who go outside.

Seems like if you were going outside often, you wouldn't need an e-ink display to tell you the weather because you'd be outside... experiencing it

Depending on where you live, if you're the type of person who spend most of the day away from home, having some understanding of the weather to expect throughout the day is very useful for not experiencing the weather too much.

Very useful to know if it's likely to rain or be windy, and the highs and lows. I might be leaving at noon when it's comfortable and warm outside, but I might be coming home needing a thick jacket and an umbrella. If I'm already outside experiencing the sudden rainstorm and my umbrella is at home, it doesn't really matter that it wasn't raining when I left home many hours ago.

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

#252

Post by MillionOClock »

This is so elegant, especially with the art lights! To me, the desirable future for connected homes is one where technology is everywhere but mostly hidden and this is such a good example! This feels like an upgraded version of a chalkboard or sticky notes, but quite an optimal upgrade: one that makes it more useful and dynamic while keeping it mostly unintrusive.

On the subject of dedicated home control dashboards, I'm not sure I see their value at all given we all have screens in our pockets, so when it comes to enabling interactive controls I feel like using your existing devices or voice controls is the right approach.

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

#253

Post by aacid »

spiralcoaster wrote: post #202
bluGill wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And the timer goes off when you are in the shower - by the time you are done you forgot about the alarm. (I have more than once stopped an alarm I intended to just snooze)

Your comment reminds me of those infomercials where they try really hard to make something as simple as cooking spaghetti look like an unimaginable nightmare that no one could possibly accomplish

You have to imagine other people might think differently than you do... I forget, it happens, nothing I can do with it. Having notification on my phone (place I'll look sooner or later) that laundry is done was great lifehack for me. No longer I forget and leave it there for whole night or even days...

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

#254

Post by silversmith »

NikxDa wrote: 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.

My solution was to buy a used Samsung tablet with OLED screen, and control the display on with motion sensors. It sits in the hallway, above the keys drawer. The screen is on only when someone's walking nearby, and around eye level when you go pick up the keys. Designed the dashboard based around muted colours on black background, with brights reserved for "hey pay attention to this" data. And most importantly, the screen is not visible from any spot you're likely to stay at for a longer time. As for mounting, I used calipers, 3d printer and some double sided tape. It's not completely seamless, but damn close for ~10% of the effort.

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

#255

Post by schrijver »

crazygringo wrote: post #120
SeriousStorm wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

I watch through the window to see the current weather, except for the temperature, which I assume is more or less the same as yesterday. I know it’s colder at night, but that’s true every night. It’s all very approximative, but I just can’t be bothered to look up the weather. I like not thinking about it at the cost of sometimes being surprised.

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

#256

Post by thaumasiotes »

greatgib wrote: post #123

When you think about it, it is crazy to think that the world is spending thousands of billions on AI stuffs, but still we haven't yet any affordable big size epaper display. It could change a lot of things in the world, especially regarding the power consumption of most commonly used screens for a lot of signage everywhere. But not that much company looks like to be interested in developing the field. I think that a…

> It could change a lot of things in the world, especially regarding the power consumption of most commonly used screens for a not of signage everywhere.

There's something I don't get about common e-paper displays.

I have a Remarkable, and it's great. The battery life is also supposed to be great. It can last for months while the Remarkable is turned off.

If the Remarkable is on, it won't last. All the battery will drain away. You have to babysit it carefully, or this is what will happen, and the next time you want to use the Remarkable, it will be dead and you'll need to charge it first.

For some reason, if left idle, it will enter a "sleeping" mode. The screen shows whatever was on the screen, with a little bar overlaid telling you that it's sleeping.

Sleeping mode is actually just awake mode. It continues to draw power as if it was on. The only difference is that it stops responding to touches. If you press the power button, it wakes up instantly, because it was already on.

Off mode is different. In off mode, the Remarkable stops drawing power. Also, it erases the screen, instead displaying a full-screen message that the Remarkable is off. You have to manually put it in off mode whenever you stop using it, or all the battery will rapidly drain away. If you press the power button, nothing will happen; you have to press it and then hold it down for two seconds (I measured this) in order to get it to boot up.

To put it into off mode, you have to do the same thing, forcefully holding down the power button while you wait for it to admit that you want it to turn off. This takes four seconds. Then you have to confirm on the screen that yes, you held the power button down for four straight seconds on purpose.

The ergonomics of this are awful. Leaving your Remarkable idle means losing your entire charge; it will never transition from awake-but-pretending-to-sleep to off. Turning it off is a huge pain. It would solve so many problems to just leave whatever was on screen before idle on the screen, and actually turn off.

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

#257

Post by fredoliveira »

Barrin92 wrote: post #176
bluGill wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not anymore - that was months ago when he did all that labor, it is no a sunk-cost. We can debate if it was worth the investment though.

Literally every person I know who is obsessed with home automation has spend thousands of bucks and hundreds if not more hours on automating things that take a second or cost two bucks for a paper version that doesn't use electricity The article is about a 2000$ eink display that shows a calendar and the weather. Your phone does that for free and you don't need to walk to the hallway every time. This is basically ant…

So you see no value in the learning that comes with the tinkering?

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

#258

Post by leokennis »

rolfus wrote: post #73
NikxDa wrote: 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 made this thing [1] for us, it uses a cheap 10" e-paper display off aliexpress, an ESP32 and a couple of I2C sensors. The case is 3D-printed. It runs on two 18650 batteries, and all in all it cost less than 100$. The OpenWeather API is free for personal use. [1] https://mjones-foui.no/img/wall_clock_1.png

Love those weather icons. Personality in software design is underrated.

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

#259

Post by dewey »

AuthAuth wrote: post #18

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…

Disclaimer: I use Home Assistant too and I'm guilty of all these things.

Home Automation is just a hobby like "productivity" tools or going all in your coffee setup. You tell yourself you are saving energy, or freeing up your mind from remembering mundane tasks but in reality it's just like a model train set.

It's fun to set up, play around and maintain it for some people. If you'd do the math of setting up hundreds of dollars worth of smart appliances, bulbs, hubs and thermostats to tweak your heaters slightly while you are not at home...it will probably take decades to break even, if at all.

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

#260

Post by schrijver »

qixv wrote: post #224

I would love to get rid of my phone more at home, eg at the dinner table, the couch etc. But I need it around to control our sound (music, tv-sound) as well as calendar, phone (heh) etc. Such a display looks awesome but it wont fix all my needs.

It’s one of the reasons I don’t like the current fashion of controlling devices from your phone. Each time you change the channel you risk seeing your notifications or are tempted to go to the apps.

Yet AV remote controls were UX hell and phones are an improvement. So maybe a separate old phone just for that ?

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