Comments on: Prototype: Twitter Watcher, the #twatch

By: Suraj

Suraj — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 13:34:37 +0000

Wonder if twatch can display my daily google calender events , without any pc

By: Ian

Ian — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 06:57:34 +0000

@Micheal – There’s an experimental version of the firmware here:
http://whereisian.com/forum/index.php?topic=141.0

By: Michael E. Califf,Sr.

Michael E. Califf,Sr. — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 03:08:40 +0000

Was wondering if there is a way to set the info so that the backlight is alwasy on when power is applied?? As it is right now I have to redo the hexfile everytime I turn off the power.
Is there a way to enter the hexfile so that it stays in the unit.

By: Ian

Ian — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 16:57:36 +0000

@steph – yes.

By: Steph

Steph — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 16:52:15 +0000

Howdy,

Might seem silly to ask, but the DC power supply is center positive, right? Just want to make sure…

By: Synonymous

Synonymous — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 00:02:24 +0000

That looks so awesome! There ma come a day when devices like this are as necessary in a person’s daily life as a mobile phone is today!

By: Ian

Ian — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 18:25:53 +0000

@dean – We looked at POE, but in the end it would add a few extra bucks per board and we didn’t have any equipment to test it.

Is there some sort of POE break out board that lets you tap the POE power supply?

By: Dean

Dean — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 17:50:44 +0000

Might consider taking a look at POE – Power Over Ethernet. Many switches these days are including that as a standard. One less cable …

By: Rhyvu

Rhyvu — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 10:08:28 +0000

Looking forward to your #twatch confession post and with regards to the VFD or LCD discussion the best option might be to get a HD44780 compatible OLED so that no compromise is made. Although I wonder what the price and availability for HD44780 compatible OLED are. I will investigate this a bit further.

By: Ian

Ian — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 07:19:22 +0000

@rhyvu – It should be possible to adapt the firmware to work with any site, it just loops through the output and looks for a tag, when it’s located, it slurps up the text. I plan to demo changes like this in the coming weeks.

The v1 dev board is entirely different than v2. It uses a PIC24FJ64GA002 and an ENC28J60 for ethernet access. It’s not as well done, either – it uses a 4bit LCD interface, has under-sized power supplies, and non-nonsensical routing. I’ll write more about it this week in a confessions post.

The VFD has a better viewing angle, faster update speed, and less ‘ghosting’ problems. Of course, I have about the cheapest LCD in the world, better LCDs would compare more favorably. This VFD was on eBay for about $7 for awhile, but it’s the Futaba serial type. I had to hot-air a few resistors on the back to different positions to use it in HD44780 mode. There are other sources of HD44780 compatible VFD screens on the net though. I really like the VFD, but it’s also a bit bulky.