8 ms·
All about whiteboard markers
- louprado 9y agoFun fact: You can use a dry erase marker to erase the writing of a permanent marker. Assuming a smooth surface, scribble the dry erase marker over the permanent mark and erase.
- simonbarker87 9y agoSpray deodorant also does the trick
- LeifCarrotson 9y agoAny organic solvent will do it. Acetone is ideal, in a metalworking shop Sharpie marks are constantly being cleaned off metal using acetone.
- rootusrootus 9y agoI hate recommending acetone flippantly. Sure, it will definitely take it off, but I'd bet that for a lot of the whiteboards in use today it would also take off the surface of the whiteboard. I do love acetone but it's my solvent of last resort.
- InclinedPlane 9y agoAcetone can also dissolve plastics so you don't want to use to remove sharpie marks except on glass or metals (or possibly wood). For anything else 99% rubbing alcohol works pretty well.
- rootusrootus 9y agoI figured this out almost 25 years ago when my commander was writing in front of our group on a great big whiteboard I had just spent several days putting pinstriping on. Spent an hour or so using a dry erase marker to remove Sharpie permanent marker. I just tried it on a whim since we had nothing to lose, and was pleasantly surprised at how effective it was.
- colinloretz 9y agoAs a coworking space operator, I thank you for this treasure trove of whiteboard marker research.
- rhizome 9y agoThis is a beautiful thing.
- tdalaa 9y agoGot way too much pleasure from this! I use these all day. Will now never not think about this every time I pick one up.
- spodek 9y agoI prefer chalkboards so much more. Reason #1: You can tell how much chalk is left. Reason #2: Not filling up landfills with plastic.
- cortesoft 9y agoI HATE chalkboards. I hate the feeling of chalk on my hand, I hate the sound chalk makes on a chalkboard, I hate the chalk dust, I hate the feel of chalkboards themselves.
- hnzix 9y agoPlus flasbacks to school and angry teachers throwing the duster at you for daydreaming.
- einrealist 9y agoI am on the opposite side of your spectrum. Serious question: Are there any bad experiences from school that you might associate with chalk and chalk boards? The only thing I hated was to clean the board, if the sponge was old and stinky. But I always liked the idea that chalk is so simple. There is always this feeling of guilt when I have to use a whiteboard, because of the eco balance.
- Dylan16807 9y agoMining and shipping chalk isn't environmentally free either.
- the_gastropod 9y agoVirtually no consumption of any kind is environmentally free. But some things are less costly than others (like chalk is to plastic)
- scott_s 9y agoI have no negative experiences related to chalk boards. But I don't like picking up chalk or touching chalk boards. It's something about the texture that makes me shiver, and it gets on my hands. I can avoid marker on my hands by being careful. Oddly, I greatly prefer hearing someone write on a chalk board. The sound is satisfying to me.
- bitshiffed 9y agoIs there something off about those photos, or are all those "green"s very cyan?
- macintux 9y agoGood point, not sure what to make of that. Given the nightmare that is color management, hard for me to guess what went wrong.
- zokier 9y agoIf I had to guess, then maybe something to do with the poor spectrum of the office lights (fluorescent?) that combined with narrow enough spectral response of the camera sensor make the curious effect. I think it is interesting how uniformly cyan the greens are, suggesting maybe that they are based on a similar dye?
- freshyill 9y agoExpo has at least three greens that I know of. I suspect this is not their greenest green.
- Fomite 9y agoYeah, I have an actively forest-green-thats-close-to-black-sometimes color from Expo that I use a lot.
- knolan 9y agoSlow day in the office?! I use a roll of dry erase film for the walls of my lab. They stick to wall with static charge. I can keep pieces of work on the wall for reference for weeks by just moving them to out of reach areas. It does make me look a little mad...
- politelemon 9y agoI actually prefer markers with a smell, and wholeheartedly disagree with its placement in the "cons" as part of an evaluation criteria. I'm also sure that I am not alone in the enjoyment of the olfactory sensations such markers provide, there are probably dozens of us who feel the same.
- userbinator 9y agoI've found that some types and brands of markers smell much better than others. Ironically, I've found the "low odour/non-toxic" inks (mainly alcohol-based) to smell worse than the old toluene/xylene ones.
- pokpokpok 9y agoWhiteboards are usually used for collaboration, and your coworkers or candidates can't really "opt out" of a smell, so it does make sense to be thoughtful about this (some people have strong aversions)
- greenyoda 9y agoThanks for being thoughtful. The smell bothers me so much that I removed the whiteboard from the wall of my office so that visitors couldn't write on it.
- audiolion 9y agoDozens of us.. subtle never nudes reference?
- jacobolus 9y agoThose sweet sweet neurotoxic solvent smells. Also provide a nice dizzy feeling, as a bonus feature.
- nickjj 9y agoIf anyone is interested, here's how you can build your own 8 foot by 4 foot whiteboard for about $15 (they normally cost around $200): https://nickjanetakis.com/blog/build-your-own-8x4-foot-whiteboard-for-15-dollars-instead-of-200 https://nickjanetakis.com/blog/build-your-own-8x4-foot-white... I've been using Expo markers for a long time. They rock.
- strictnein 9y agoThat's awesome. I've been looking for something exactly like that. That price is insane. Hell, even with having it delivered to my house it's under $100.
- mythrwy 9y agoCan confirm it works well. I even found some 1/8 trim plastic (also at Home Depot, don't recall the section, think it was flooring or where they have molding for walls). Slipped right over the edges and cut at an angle for corners it looks pretty professional. Only downside is I left a DB schema on the board for months and now can't get it off. Probably there is a solvent that would do it but haven't really looked yet. That might be a problem with regular whiteboards also though.
- dawnerd 9y agoI'd try just a little windex. Had this awful whiteboard for a while that just would not clean normally. Window cleaner though? did the trick perfectly.
- rgacote 9y agoTry going over the image with a fresh marker. My daughter figured out that you can then easily erase the image.
- antod 9y agoThat technique is also quite effective for removing permanent marker from a whiteboard.
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- joezydeco 9y agoAm I the only one that finds the caps on Expo markers tear the tip apart after a few dozen open/close cycles? A brand new Expo marker is a joy, but a month-old one tends to be a piece of shit.
- CarVac 9y agoI use them for months without that ever happening, and I'm very particular about capping them every single time I even pause for a short time.
- chasedehan 9y agoIts amazing what HN can do for you. I have never cared about whiteboard markers but just spent 20 minutes reading about the differences and then looking on amazon to see what the price differences are.
- DiThi 9y agoI'm surprised Velleda doesn't get a single mention. They were* synonymous with whiteboard markers here in Spain. Quality and durability were very high. The smell was strong but I liked it much more than other markers. I can barely find any information about it before it belonged to Bic. It used to have the brand "Conté". * and still are, making it even more difficult to find information.
- RandallBrown 9y agoThis is without a doubt, the strangest, most well researched article I've ever seen on Hacker News. I've mostly used Expo markers and it was weird skimming this because I felt like I had some weird brand allegiance, even though I have no reason to really care much about markers.
- Fomite 9y agoSame for me. I was looking at my huge collection of Expo markers going "Yeah Expo!"...which makes no sense.
- btgeekboy 9y agoSomewhat validates my preferences, as well. Work seems to have both Staples-branded markers and Expo markers. I'll go for the Expo markers every time, primarily because the Staples ones don't erase well at all after being on the board for a few days.
- f_allwein 9y agoSide point: can I suggest we all throw away whiteboard markers that don't work any more? In my experience, people will just place them back in the tray and keep trying other markers until they find one that works. There is probably someone whose job it is to replace markers, but they would just replace missing ones rather than try every single one to see if they still work. So throwing away dead markers speeds up the process. Or use refillable markers, of course.
- Bromskloss 9y agoGot it. Whenever we come across a dead marker, we throw the board away and get a blackboard instead! About that, could we have a similar article on blackboards and chalk? All I know is that there was much ado [0,1,2] about a certain Japanese manufacturer shutting down a couple of years ago. They, allegedly, made the best chalk and prices on the secondary market rose high after the news came out. [0] https://www.reddit.com/r/math/comments/3a05u3/why_mathematicians_are_hoarding_this_special_type/ https://www.reddit.com/r/math/comments/3a05u3/why_mathematic... [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/math/comments/3axqxe/hagoromo_president_explains_why_he_closed_down/ https://www.reddit.com/r/math/comments/3axqxe/hagoromo_presi... [2] https://www.reddit.com/r/math/comments/3rciv0/an_update_on_where_to_buy_highquality_chalk/ https://www.reddit.com/r/math/comments/3rciv0/an_update_on_w...
- NegativeLatency 9y agoAlso the new chalk that makes dust that is safer to breathe doesn't write as well as the older kind that is bad for your lungs. Very similar to leaded/unleaded solder.
- jacobolus 9y agoLeaded solder is actually generally better for your health (just don’t eat it). The unleaded stuff has really nasty flux, and requires much higher temperatures, meaning the fumes are quite a bit worse. Make sure you have very good ventilation when working with unleaded solder.
- fma 9y agoI've purchased markers from Dollar Tree. I wish he had compared to those. For my purpose they work and a hell lot cheaper.
- freshyill 9y agoI wish he included Amazon Basics markers, because in my experience they’re garbage and I’d like some validation. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
- blt 9y agothe most important thing is to have a huge stock of whiteboard markers, like 40 of them, and order more when it gets down to 20. much time is wasted searching for good whiteboard markers. bad markers add mental overhead of deciphering faint lines when the material presented is already challenging. chalk has neither problem.
- reificator 9y agoI would take either of those downsides over the sound of chalk.
- Splendor 9y agoQuartet makes my favorite dry erase markers. I'm curious how they would have fared. https://smile.amazon.com/Quartet-Accessory-EnduraGlide-Assorted-5001M-5SK/dp/B0054TMPZU/ https://smile.amazon.com/Quartet-Accessory-EnduraGlide-Assor...
- baldfat 9y agoWas on a review visit to Princeton with about 12 other people from various colleges and universities. We saw that Princeton was installing boards, I assumed it was whiteboards. I said just now installing whiteboards? No we are replacing all the white boards with chalk boards, because evn Princeton Professors can't tell the difference between a Sharpie and a Dry Erase marker. Everyone in my group stated laughing and I just thought as the guy in charge of classroom equipment, hmm how can we get rid of these $5,000 document readers at my school no on can figure them out.
- Symbiote 9y agoDo you mean things like [1]? That's my university, which was using them 12 years ago while I attended. It's a high resolution camera pointing straight down at an evenly-lit sheet of ordinary A3 paper. The "board" (the projector screen) was at a height that everyone could see. The lecturer could write with whatever pens they wanted; could continue from the previous lecture easily; could look forwards at the students rather than having their back to the class. They could show a page from a book, or bits of a robot or circuit board. There was no chalk dust, no marker smell, no dirty boards, no worn-out faint markers, no mistakes with permanent markers. No-one ever had trouble using it. Most rooms had two projectors, and the touchscreen on the right selected an input for each projector (desktop computer, laptop, DVD player, visualiser etc). [1] http://www.imperial.ac.uk/ImageCropToolT4/imageTool/uploaded-images/charingcross-brian-01--tojpeg_1448987676485_x2.jpg http://www.imperial.ac.uk/ImageCropToolT4/imageTool/uploaded... or http://www.imperial.ac.uk/events-and-hospitality/venues/charingcross/ http://www.imperial.ac.uk/events-and-hospitality/venues/char... Presumably this is the manufacturer: https://elmoeurope.com/product-category/visualiser/ https://elmoeurope.com/product-category/visualiser/
- baldfat 9y agoYes but ours were Wolfvision. The reason why I wanted to get rid of them was A) The professors would try to fold them down and pull and break the arms and the damage the table. B) They ended up eating a ton of my equipment budget. For some reason the staff as a whole decided that it was ridiculous the college spent so much on the equipment (Up to $100,000 per large classroom) and revolted on touching anything because they didn't want to be responsible for damaging them. No one on my staff ever threatened anyone nor did the administration. After a few years I left but man the document reader was always the drama point. When I was in the classroom teaching I would go out of my way to use them all the tim.
- dfee 9y agoAre there best practices for clearing a whiteboard? After a day with writing left on the board, I usually have to get a couple folks to help me scrub it down with Lysol wipes and dry that off with paper towels just to get it back to clean.
- viewtransform 9y agoTrader Joe's Multi-Purpose Cleaner. The green stuff. Spray and wipe the board with a microfiber cloth or any cloth rag. Cleans perfectly and smells great too.
- scott_s 9y agoWater works fine. I have left things up on my white board for more than a year, and I can get it off with water, paper towels, some grit and patience.
- thomastjeffery 9y ago> some grit and patience. I think the point is to avoid that when it is trivial to do so.
- scott_s 9y agoWhen water is readily available from multiple sources literally on tap, I'll happily just use that.
- thomastjeffery 9y agoThat's totally fine. But if using water requires "grit and patience", and this is something you do regularly, it's reasonable to want to replace "grit and patience" with a solvent.
- scott_s 9y agoGrit and patience is only required when I leave things up for a year. Which does happen.
- seaknoll 9y ago> Expo and Sharpie go next. They are OK to hold and work. But ladies might find their caps a bit challenging to attach/disattach — it really takes some physical effort. Can't speak to the Sharpies, but Expo caps require a completely uncommentworthy level of effort to remove. - lady with Expos
- TheAdamist 9y agoI don't know about other brands, but the juvenile in me loves how the expo caps stack on to each other to make swords/what have you
- car 9y agoFound these to be a good and cheap whiteboards, have them all around the house for notes, reminders and brainstorming: https://teslaamazing.com https://teslaamazing.com
- mechhrt 9y agoThis is a great example of knowledge that should be on a webpage somewhere. I feel the Medium format is really limiting the presentation of the information.
- pimlottc 9y agoI feel it's necessary to post this equally obsessive companion piece about whiteboard cleaners: http://rumkin.com/reference/whiteboard/cleaners.php http://rumkin.com/reference/whiteboard/cleaners.php
- ScottBurson 9y agoI bought the MB10W cleaner on the recommendation of this article and have been very happy with it.
- megaman22 9y agoTime for some heresy... I just do not understand the obsession with whiteboards that seems to be almost a requirement among programmers and software engineers. I've probably used a whiteboard by choice two or three times in the last ten years. They are terrible; I'd much rather scrawl on a regular sheet of paper, if it's throw-away stuff, or fire up Visio if it's something worth keeping.
- eponeponepon 9y agoMy working assumption is that it makes a certain type of person feel like they're doing Real Academic Stuff, and not just showing off that they can remember syntax without an IDE highlighting their screwups. (full disclosure: I cannot remember syntax without an IDE highlighting my screwups)
- __s 9y agoI'm at a workplace where 5 of our walls have been coated into being white boards. We also have a couple of whiteboards on wheels. We don't write code on whiteboards. Instead, we tend to write: data diagrams, UI mock up discussions, project planning, month end acknowledgements, scrum board notes / grids, brain storming (often in meetings), retro columns of good/bad/ugly, announcements to the office like new wifi password or when people are away Recently we started a new project. I worked out a database schema around the concept of an Entity Component System. You have an Entity table with a primary id column & nothing else, & no other table has a primary key. I scribbled out some tables manually & was able to demonstrate the flexibility this enables to the team
- Fomite 9y agoDoes this mean I get an exemption for loving whiteboards because I am doing Real Academic Stuff (tm)?
- nearmuse 9y agoPaper creates mess when you write on it (barring stuff out and erasing pencil are both messy) and afterwards (pile it or throw away, arguably more mess than used markers).
- jwilk 9y agoWhy would anyone want a grey marker?
- thomastjeffery 9y agoTo write with lower contrast. What you write in grey will (hopefully) blend into the background, allowing your mind to focus on the other colors. This is a common tactic with text editors: drawing comments using a very low-contrast color.