My wife has a little thermal camera (Vivitar Instant Camera) that she takes to parties and events. The picture/print quality is a bit better than a gameboy camera, certainly not HD, but also fractions of a cent per picture rather than a dollar like you'd pay for a Polaroid. Fun stuff.
I invited strangers to message me through a receipt printer
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Re: I invited strangers to message me through a receipt printer
#72For those interested I open-sourced library in Ruby which does thermal printing:
https://github.com/tablecheck/thermal/
Among other things it has very broad printer support and Chinese-Japanese-Korean character support (requires purchasing a model with the chars preloaded). It's still under active development but it references the PHP library the author mentions. This lib is actually used in a many restaurants in Asia.
Re: I invited strangers to message me through a receipt printer
#73If you do this be sure to buy BPA free receipt paper Handling receipt paper is what turned out to be the cause of the high BPA numbers when boba tea was tested https://x.com/natfriedman/status/1899641377002025252
I did! I also use gloves when handling a large amount of the receipts. I worked as a cashier for years in my teens and twenties though, so it’s probably already in my blood.
I mean, over time it would exit right?
Re: I invited strangers to message me through a receipt printer
#74Russian writer Leonid Kaganov had this idea back in 2021, with an added twist that he also put the printer in his bathroom: https://lleo.me/dnevnik/2021/11/30
Doesn't know his 3 shells
Re: I invited strangers to message me through a receipt printer
#75I have wanted to do experiments with a receipt printer hooked up to a Raspberry Pi, with some simple controls... but every time I look up the cost of the printer I balk. It's probably not fair, but I guess in my head it feels like they should be cheaper. Or at least the cost then makes me question how much time I'm really ready to put into stuff like debugging the printer drivers and putting together a case, etc etc.…
I recently bought a thermal ESC/POS printer for 25 Euros on Aliexpress but I saw the sames ones for 30 Euro on Amazon.
I connected it to my linux server and without any drivers I can print with e.g.: `echo "Hello World!" >> /dev/usb/lp0`.
It also supports bar/QR codes.
Re: I invited strangers to message me through a receipt printer
#76I read the title as "massage me", and was very confused for a few seconds.
Glad I wasn’t the only one.
But knowing the things that pop up on HN, something like remotely massaging someone via a receipt printer is totally believable.
I’m actually hoping someone reads this and creates a remote massaging receipt printer.
Re: I invited strangers to message me through a receipt printer
#77I'd love to have an impact receipt printer for this so I don't have to source thermal paper etc.
They aren't difficult to find, but they're too expensive for a stupid project like this, which is a glorified fax machine.
Re: I invited strangers to message me through a receipt printer
#78Re: I invited strangers to message me through a receipt printer
#79There was a REALLY cool project by the design firm Berg in the UK about ~13 years ago. Cute little thermal printer with online services that allowed you to have scheduled printouts of things like weather reports, horoscopes, etc. And... oh my goodness, I was looking for pictures of it and it turns out some kind person decided to put work in on having a way to do onprem services for it! [Check it out here]( https://no…
I remember wanting the Berg printer but it was crazy expensive
Yeah we unfortunately are spoiled with mass manufacturing. If they'd been popular enough for them to make a million Berg printers, the price would have been more in line with what we expect.
Re: I invited strangers to message me through a receipt printer
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
I did! I also use gloves when handling a large amount of the receipts. I worked as a cashier for years in my teens and twenties though, so it’s probably already in my blood.
I mean, over time it would exit right?
It lingers in fat tissue and once at a low enough level your liver doesn't really clear it. But that kind of level isn't necessarily linked to increased risks of diabetes or heart disease.