4 ms·

I've actually been working on something of this sort with a battery-powered Raspberry PI running Debian and a Pervasive 7-inch e-Paper display. I whipped up a

I've actually been working on something of this sort with a battery-powered Raspberry PI running Debian and a Pervasive 7-inch e-Paper display. I whipped up a pretty decent prototype that had a terminal (so, Emacs, w3m, newsbeuter, etc.), PDF reader, and rough support for keyboard-driven X apps, but then my little girl got to the wiring with scissors, and my momentum died. (It also had a small character LED display to show rapid feedback while typing.) The last few days I've been working on a new version of the software, and I think I'll wire it back up. If I get it clean enough for others to use, I'll write it up.

RepressedEmu 9y ago
This sounds really cool! Does this project have a name?
- JasonFruit 9y ago
  The Papertop. (It's a working title.)
  - dalbasal 9y ago
    PaperPi?
  - RepressedEmu 9y ago
    Have you written any kind of blog or documentation about the build? I've been interested in a mini-laptop e-ink solution for a while. I think that most of the coding I do takes very little resources and is primarily just talking to the cloud or other servers. No reason to lug around a bunch of resources I don't need, right?
    - JasonFruit 9y ago
      I haven't, and I'm disappointed to see that the display I used is now discontinued. That will push me to use a more effective one in the next iteration, which I'll write up.
spiderfarmer 9y ago
Would love to know more!
- JasonFruit 9y ago
  I'll submit a Show HN when I get to a point to do so.
willcodeforfoo 9y ago
Looking forward to more information about this as well. I'm thinking about wiring up an e-Paper display to a Pi for some digital signage applications and curious how you got it all to work, and the prices for doing so!
- JasonFruit 9y ago
  I used a 7.4" display from Pervasive, about $50USD. It's a simple development board with an easy to drive controller. All the software was in Python, with a few performance-critical bits in Cython. I used wire wrapping to hook things up, and it was not difficulty, even though I'm a programmer with no previous hardware experience.
borgel 9y ago
Ditto, very interested. You wouldn't happen to have any photos of the prototype, would you?
- JasonFruit 9y ago
  I have at least a photo of emacs running on a very early version, but it's not representative of what I eventually arrived at. I'll see if I can dig it up.

RepressedEmu 9y ago

This sounds really cool! Does this project have a name?

JasonFruit 9y ago
The Papertop. (It's a working title.)
- dalbasal 9y ago
  PaperPi?
- RepressedEmu 9y ago
  Have you written any kind of blog or documentation about the build? I've been interested in a mini-laptop e-ink solution for a while. I think that most of the coding I do takes very little resources and is primarily just talking to the cloud or other servers. No reason to lug around a bunch of resources I don't need, right?
  - JasonFruit 9y ago
    I haven't, and I'm disappointed to see that the display I used is now discontinued. That will push me to use a more effective one in the next iteration, which I'll write up.

spiderfarmer 9y ago

Would love to know more!

JasonFruit 9y ago
I'll submit a Show HN when I get to a point to do so.

willcodeforfoo 9y ago

Looking forward to more information about this as well. I'm thinking about wiring up an e-Paper display to a Pi for some digital signage applications and curious how you got it all to work, and the prices for doing so!

JasonFruit 9y ago
I used a 7.4" display from Pervasive, about $50USD. It's a simple development board with an easy to drive controller. All the software was in Python, with a few performance-critical bits in Cython. I used wire wrapping to hook things up, and it was not difficulty, even though I'm a programmer with no previous hardware experience.

borgel 9y ago

Ditto, very interested. You wouldn't happen to have any photos of the prototype, would you?

JasonFruit 9y ago
I have at least a photo of emacs running on a very early version, but it's not representative of what I eventually arrived at. I'll see if I can dig it up.