I built Timeframe, our family e-paper dashboard • Hacker News Board

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

#381

Post by eddieroger » Tue, Feb 24, 2026, 9:05 PM UTC

tb303 wrote: post #244

I went down the same path and up until last week had three e-ink surfaces in my house for this running off HA. We got a skylight 27 today. It’s better. I give in. E-ink is fine for display but too slow for interactivity.

I feel very torn between the “make something” or “buy a Slylight” decision, so I’m curious what makes it better in your eyes, so much so that you don’t think it’s worth attempting anymore. I’m struggling to justify a monthly fee for what I perceive is a daily calendar view with chores.

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

#382

Post by silversmith » Thu, Feb 26, 2026, 7:55 AM UTC

remlov wrote: post #306

silversmith wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 s…

Would love some details how you enabled controlling the display with motion sensors.

The tablet itself runs https://www.fully-kiosk.com/ to display a web dashboard. Fully Kiosk has good Home Assistant integration, including screen on / off controls. I also have a bunch of Sonoff battry operated zigbee motion sensors scattered around the place. Then Home Assistant does what it was meant to do - act as a glue layer between various systems, firing screen control commands to Fully Kiosk as a result of select motion sensors triggering.

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

#383

Post by silversmith » Thu, Feb 26, 2026, 7:58 AM UTC

Sander_Marechal wrote: post #374

silversmith wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 s…

What's the software stack? Did you write an app for it? Jailbreak it?

No jailbreak necessary - the tablet runs https://www.fully-kiosk.com/, and displays a web dashboard.

The dashboard itself is a react app talking to my Home Assitant instance over a websocket. The heavy lifting of bringing various data sources together is done by HA, I just wrote a react app because it seemed easier than learning to customize HA dashboards to the degree I wanted to.

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

#384

Post by tertius » Fri, Feb 27, 2026, 6:50 PM UTC

ktzar wrote: post #65

I LOVE this, but I am still love the Sunday night family bonding moment of planning the week in the pen and paper weekly planner that also costs us $10 a year.

Which planner do you use?

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

#385

Post by Fred27 » Wed, Mar 04, 2026, 9:20 AM UTC

I found some of these Visionect displays cheap on eBay and was planning to do the same. I found the backend Docker conatiner was unstable and kept crashing so I parked the project. Maybe I'll have to look at it again.