6 ms·

Making your own e-paper dashboard for home from scratch (2021)

89 points by ljf 4y ago

dvfjsdhgfv 4y ago
I wonder if it wouldn't be easier and maybe even cheaper to install custom hardware in an older e-ink reader. Kindle 1st gen costs €10-€20.
dannyw 4y ago
I have a old Kindle, can I do this using the old hardware?
- amenghra 4y ago
  Old Kindles' can be jail broken. From there, the sky is the limit. E.g. https://www.turnkeylinux.org/blog/kindle-root https://www.turnkeylinux.org/blog/kindle-root
- dry_soup 4y ago
  I have my old Kindle displaying the weather through the built-in browser, using this code: https://github.com/matopeto/kindle-weather-dashboard https://github.com/matopeto/kindle-weather-dashboard If you want to display something more, you could just self-host a page.
  - elevaet 4y ago
    What a great project, and it looks good too! How do weather updates work, does the page refresh itself somehow, or does Kindle run js?
    - dry_soup 4y ago
      I think the Kindle browser runs at least basic JS. In any case it refreshes maybe every half hour or so, which is plenty for weather. Come to think of it I think the Kindle browser is based on WebKit, so it probably runs any JS that the version of WebKit supports, but given the low-power processor and the 0.5 FPS display, you probably won't get anything too crazy to work.
dijital 4y ago
> Once the ink is there, it won't go way by itself. It occurs to me that an interesting low-power extension could be to have the device turn itself off after refreshing the display and then plug it in via a timer switch. If the dashboard only needed hourly or daily updates and the previously rendered dashboard stays visible, there's no need to leave the Raspberry Pi running all the time.
- sdflhasjd 4y ago
  This is how I've done it with some of my eink projects. The downside is that powering down loses the display buffer needed to correctly do partial updates, do you have to refresh the display every time - which is actually very distracting if it's sitting on your desk.
  - OJFord 4y ago
    Is that built in to the display unit? It can't be loaded (from your own non-volatile(/battery or cap backed) memory) prior to triggering display update? (I've never used one.)
- zeroflow 4y ago
  That's why I'm doing this with an ESP32 instead of an RPi. The ESP32 has the builtin capability to deep sleep and only draw a few uA of current. In addition, WaveShare offers existing micropython libraries, so it's easy to just flash an ESP32 board with micropython, get your data from an API, format it and go to sleep after displaying it. There are lots of boards with onboard LiIon management, this this setup is very easy to do.
  - zozbot234 4y ago
    The Raspberry Pi Pico W might be an alternative these days. Of course with only a couple Cortex M0 cores and 264KB RAM running JavaScript would be less than feasible, but rendering a pure black and white framebuffer for a e-ink screen should work OK.
_def 4y ago
I really want to build this. Is it possible to prevent frequent screen updates?
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
csdvrx 4y ago
Running a lot of javascript with npm and pupeteer just to render a small picture on a monochrome eink display seems extremely wasteful to me. You might as well have a ftp site (or equivalent) where you would just dump a YYYYMMDDHHMMSS.png (or jpg or whatever) and a script that just sends the latest to the display. That would also let you run everything from initrd, so you can follow by a poweroff (and schedule a RTC wake in say 20 minutes)
- realharo 4y ago
  Using a Raspberry Pi is very wasteful in the first place. If it's powered from USB, it doesn't really matter, but if you want to power it from batteries (especially something like AAA NiMH batteries) so that you can easily hang it on a wall somewhere and make it last a month or so (refresh every 10-15 minutes maybe), you pretty much have to use something much more low power (like an ESP8266, ESP32, etc.). Having pre-stored pictures is also unnecessary, just generate them on the fly. Unless generating the picture takes a long time (e.g. having to contact a lot of slow external services), you can just draw it on the server in memory with each request. In the same request, the device can also send its battery voltage to the server, where you can collect it as metrics.
  - csdvrx 4y ago
    Totally this! I was just suggesting a slightly more efficient way that would not require the author to buy new hardware, but I agree: an ESP with direct IO to the "framebuffer" is better.
Eric_WVGG 4y ago
Anyone interested in trying this should check out the Inkplate. They’re recycled kindle screens that have a built-in microcontroller and Wi-Fi. All you need to add is a memory card flashed with the an OS image, no soldering or other parts needed. https://inkplate.io/ https://inkplate.io/
eddyg 4y ago
See also https://inkplate.io/ https://inkplate.io/, which is a Wi-Fi-enabled display made from recycled Kindles (GitHub repo is here: https://github.com/e-radionicacom/Inkplate-6-hardware https://github.com/e-radionicacom/Inkplate-6-hardware) They also have a 9.7” version: https://www.crowdsupply.com/soldered/inkplate-10 https://www.crowdsupply.com/soldered/inkplate-10
ljf 4y ago
For awareness, I shared this here after I read about it on the 'side projects making more that $500 a month' thread (older thread that was linked to after it was asked again this morning.) Thanks to jlengrand https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=jlengrand https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=jlengrand for sharing this! This link was posted as an alternative to someone's paid project https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30002491 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30002491 I love it, really want to make something similar, just need the time/focus!
JadoJodo 4y ago
This is super cool, and definitely something I've wanted to do for a while. One nitpick: It seems odd that, if I understand correctly, the data being served is from Netlify. Why not serve it locally on the device?
davelondon 4y ago
Nice. I'm doing something similar with a BOOX Mira 13.3" touch screen, Raspberry Pi Zero and a Gioui app for the user interface. I'm building an expedition vehicle on the back of a Mercedes Actros 6x6 semi-truck. I'm using M5Stack ESP32 devices (flashed with esphome) to read all the sensors and control everything. I'm using a MQTT server as the messaging hub: the UI will read/write from that, and the ESP32 devices will subscribe to that for controls. Here's my notes on getting the e-ink screen working full-screen with a Gioui app (without a desktop linux environment): https://github.com/dave/iot/tree/main/ui https://github.com/dave/iot/tree/main/ui It would be great to find a cheaper alternative (the BOOX Mira is $800 ouch!)

89 points by ljf 4y ago

I wonder if it wouldn't be easier and maybe even cheaper to install custom hardware in an older e-ink reader. Kindle 1st gen costs €10-€20.

dannyw 4y ago

I have a old Kindle, can I do this using the old hardware?

amenghra 4y ago
Old Kindles' can be jail broken. From there, the sky is the limit. E.g. https://www.turnkeylinux.org/blog/kindle-root https://www.turnkeylinux.org/blog/kindle-root
dry_soup 4y ago
I have my old Kindle displaying the weather through the built-in browser, using this code: https://github.com/matopeto/kindle-weather-dashboard https://github.com/matopeto/kindle-weather-dashboard If you want to display something more, you could just self-host a page.
- elevaet 4y ago
  What a great project, and it looks good too! How do weather updates work, does the page refresh itself somehow, or does Kindle run js?
  - dry_soup 4y ago
    I think the Kindle browser runs at least basic JS. In any case it refreshes maybe every half hour or so, which is plenty for weather. Come to think of it I think the Kindle browser is based on WebKit, so it probably runs any JS that the version of WebKit supports, but given the low-power processor and the 0.5 FPS display, you probably won't get anything too crazy to work.

dijital 4y ago

> Once the ink is there, it won't go way by itself. It occurs to me that an interesting low-power extension could be to have the device turn itself off after refreshing the display and then plug it in via a timer switch. If the dashboard only needed hourly or daily updates and the previously rendered dashboard stays visible, there's no need to leave the Raspberry Pi running all the time.

sdflhasjd 4y ago
This is how I've done it with some of my eink projects. The downside is that powering down loses the display buffer needed to correctly do partial updates, do you have to refresh the display every time - which is actually very distracting if it's sitting on your desk.
- OJFord 4y ago
  Is that built in to the display unit? It can't be loaded (from your own non-volatile(/battery or cap backed) memory) prior to triggering display update? (I've never used one.)
zeroflow 4y ago
That's why I'm doing this with an ESP32 instead of an RPi. The ESP32 has the builtin capability to deep sleep and only draw a few uA of current. In addition, WaveShare offers existing micropython libraries, so it's easy to just flash an ESP32 board with micropython, get your data from an API, format it and go to sleep after displaying it. There are lots of boards with onboard LiIon management, this this setup is very easy to do.
- zozbot234 4y ago
  The Raspberry Pi Pico W might be an alternative these days. Of course with only a couple Cortex M0 cores and 264KB RAM running JavaScript would be less than feasible, but rendering a pure black and white framebuffer for a e-ink screen should work OK.

_def 4y ago

I really want to build this. Is it possible to prevent frequent screen updates?

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

csdvrx 4y ago

Running a lot of javascript with npm and pupeteer just to render a small picture on a monochrome eink display seems extremely wasteful to me. You might as well have a ftp site (or equivalent) where you would just dump a YYYYMMDDHHMMSS.png (or jpg or whatever) and a script that just sends the latest to the display. That would also let you run everything from initrd, so you can follow by a poweroff (and schedule a RTC wake in say 20 minutes)

realharo 4y ago
Using a Raspberry Pi is very wasteful in the first place. If it's powered from USB, it doesn't really matter, but if you want to power it from batteries (especially something like AAA NiMH batteries) so that you can easily hang it on a wall somewhere and make it last a month or so (refresh every 10-15 minutes maybe), you pretty much have to use something much more low power (like an ESP8266, ESP32, etc.). Having pre-stored pictures is also unnecessary, just generate them on the fly. Unless generating the picture takes a long time (e.g. having to contact a lot of slow external services), you can just draw it on the server in memory with each request. In the same request, the device can also send its battery voltage to the server, where you can collect it as metrics.
- csdvrx 4y ago
  Totally this! I was just suggesting a slightly more efficient way that would not require the author to buy new hardware, but I agree: an ESP with direct IO to the "framebuffer" is better.

Eric_WVGG 4y ago

Anyone interested in trying this should check out the Inkplate. They’re recycled kindle screens that have a built-in microcontroller and Wi-Fi. All you need to add is a memory card flashed with the an OS image, no soldering or other parts needed. https://inkplate.io/ https://inkplate.io/

eddyg 4y ago

See also https://inkplate.io/ https://inkplate.io/, which is a Wi-Fi-enabled display made from recycled Kindles (GitHub repo is here: https://github.com/e-radionicacom/Inkplate-6-hardware https://github.com/e-radionicacom/Inkplate-6-hardware) They also have a 9.7” version: https://www.crowdsupply.com/soldered/inkplate-10 https://www.crowdsupply.com/soldered/inkplate-10

ljf 4y ago

For awareness, I shared this here after I read about it on the 'side projects making more that $500 a month' thread (older thread that was linked to after it was asked again this morning.) Thanks to jlengrand https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=jlengrand https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=jlengrand for sharing this! This link was posted as an alternative to someone's paid project https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30002491 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30002491 I love it, really want to make something similar, just need the time/focus!

JadoJodo 4y ago

This is super cool, and definitely something I've wanted to do for a while. One nitpick: It seems odd that, if I understand correctly, the data being served is from Netlify. Why not serve it locally on the device?

davelondon 4y ago

Nice. I'm doing something similar with a BOOX Mira 13.3" touch screen, Raspberry Pi Zero and a Gioui app for the user interface. I'm building an expedition vehicle on the back of a Mercedes Actros 6x6 semi-truck. I'm using M5Stack ESP32 devices (flashed with esphome) to read all the sensors and control everything. I'm using a MQTT server as the messaging hub: the UI will read/write from that, and the ESP32 devices will subscribe to that for controls. Here's my notes on getting the e-ink screen working full-screen with a Gioui app (without a desktop linux environment): https://github.com/dave/iot/tree/main/ui https://github.com/dave/iot/tree/main/ui It would be great to find a cheaper alternative (the BOOX Mira is $800 ouch!)