Typing in electronic ink
Today is 4 years since I became acquainted with electronic ink screens.
Be that as it may, but carefully four years NOOK Simple Touch (NST) serves me faithfully as a reader. And just as much there is my interest not only to read from E Ink screens, but also to print on them.
There are three ways to adapt the E Ink display to typing:
Consider each of these methods.
In June 2015, the sale of the world's first monitor based on “electronic ink” - 13.3 '' Dasung Paperlike ( video ). The price of the monitor is about 1000 USD 1 , 2 .
Typing on-screen keyboard in one way or another supports almost every electronic ink device. At the same time, as of the end of 2015, not a single device with an E Ink display that officially supports the connection of an external keyboard has been mass-produced.
Enthusiasts on different readers worked out schemes using USB OTG, Bluetooth, WiFi.
This scheme was worked out by enthusiasts in 2011 ( Kindle , NST ).
In August 2013, a domestic enthusiast wrote a program that is a specialized VNC client for Pocketbook readers.
Since the Nuk was rutted immediately after the purchase, the ability to type on it was tested immediately. As expected, typing on a screen with a diagonal of 6 inches and the sky-high update interval was incredibly inconvenient.
It was February 2012, when a post appeared on the XDA , which, in many ways, solved the problem with the update interval, and typing on Nuka became a real opportunity. But whenever I aimed my finger at the small, unresponsive display of the nuk, I clearly recognized the desire to connect an external keyboard.
It turned out that the ability of NST to switch to USB OTG was discovered a month earlier. Connecting an external keyboard to Nuk became real, which actually meant the ability to fully print "electronic ink".
So, to implement this feature, a micro USB OTG connector and a wireless USB keyboard (with a set of keys for Windows) were specially purchased, and a hub with external power was also purchased. The software was configured: the Nook was modified accordingly, a utility was installed that switched the device to the USB host, an application was found and installed that provided adequate interaction with the external keyboard. Everything worked!
NOOK Simple Touch can be powered from the network with a fully charged battery, and the idea of using a hub with external power turned out to be working, which solved the problem of quickly discharging the device that is running on the host.
The optimization phase has begun.
First of all, it was necessary to debug the so-called. keyboard layout files nuka, because "out of the box" not all keyboard keys showed the corresponding characters on the screen. In addition, it was necessary to bind to the keyboard and the functions of soft keys.
Ultimately, the bindings took the following form.
I had to reassign the arrow keys - it’s the “reappointment”, since it is convenient to print on the nook only in landscape mode (a chain of connectors hanging from the micro USB input prevents printing in portrait mode), and in landscape mode Android automatically reassigns the arrows.
Shift, as it should be, provides a case change.
Caps Lock does not work, and instead double-clicks the shift key.
The layout is switched by the combination of Alt + Shift.
Next, the optimal text editor was selected, providing such valuable options as a custom toolbar, font and font size of the displayed text with support for custom fonts, and the presence of keyboard shortcuts for an external keyboard (sic!).
Thus, all conditions have already been created for working in a text editor.
The conditions for more or less comfortable work on the NST itself, which would resemble work on a “genuine” Android device, and in Android 2.1 itself, which would resemble work on Windows, were already created earlier. For this purpose, a number of tweaks were applied.
The text of this article is in electronic ink.
As it turned out, "the king is not real."
Truly electronic ink was developed by British scientists .
Be that as it may, but carefully four years NOOK Simple Touch (NST) serves me faithfully as a reader. And just as much there is my interest not only to read from E Ink screens, but also to print on them.
Typing with E Ink Displays: Problem Status
There are three ways to adapt the E Ink display to typing:
- type text on a computer and display the image on an external E Ink monitor,
- type text on a mobile E Ink device
- type text on a computer, and display the image on a mobile E Ink device via VNC.
Consider each of these methods.
Type text on a computer and display the image on an external E Ink monitor
In June 2015, the sale of the world's first monitor based on “electronic ink” - 13.3 '' Dasung Paperlike ( video ). The price of the monitor is about 1000 USD 1 , 2 .
Type on mobile E Ink device
Typing on-screen keyboard in one way or another supports almost every electronic ink device. At the same time, as of the end of 2015, not a single device with an E Ink display that officially supports the connection of an external keyboard has been mass-produced.
Enthusiasts on different readers worked out schemes using USB OTG, Bluetooth, WiFi.
Type text on a computer, and display the image on a mobile E Ink device via VNC
This scheme was worked out by enthusiasts in 2011 ( Kindle , NST ).
In August 2013, a domestic enthusiast wrote a program that is a specialized VNC client for Pocketbook readers.
How was it with me
Since the Nuk was rutted immediately after the purchase, the ability to type on it was tested immediately. As expected, typing on a screen with a diagonal of 6 inches and the sky-high update interval was incredibly inconvenient.
It was February 2012, when a post appeared on the XDA , which, in many ways, solved the problem with the update interval, and typing on Nuka became a real opportunity. But whenever I aimed my finger at the small, unresponsive display of the nuk, I clearly recognized the desire to connect an external keyboard.
It turned out that the ability of NST to switch to USB OTG was discovered a month earlier. Connecting an external keyboard to Nuk became real, which actually meant the ability to fully print "electronic ink".
So, to implement this feature, a micro USB OTG connector and a wireless USB keyboard (with a set of keys for Windows) were specially purchased, and a hub with external power was also purchased. The software was configured: the Nook was modified accordingly, a utility was installed that switched the device to the USB host, an application was found and installed that provided adequate interaction with the external keyboard. Everything worked!
NOOK Simple Touch can be powered from the network with a fully charged battery, and the idea of using a hub with external power turned out to be working, which solved the problem of quickly discharging the device that is running on the host.
The optimization phase has begun.
First of all, it was necessary to debug the so-called. keyboard layout files nuka, because "out of the box" not all keyboard keys showed the corresponding characters on the screen. In addition, it was necessary to bind to the keyboard and the functions of soft keys.
Ultimately, the bindings took the following form.
I had to reassign the arrow keys - it’s the “reappointment”, since it is convenient to print on the nook only in landscape mode (a chain of connectors hanging from the micro USB input prevents printing in portrait mode), and in landscape mode Android automatically reassigns the arrows.
Shift, as it should be, provides a case change.
Caps Lock does not work, and instead double-clicks the shift key.
The layout is switched by the combination of Alt + Shift.
Next, the optimal text editor was selected, providing such valuable options as a custom toolbar, font and font size of the displayed text with support for custom fonts, and the presence of keyboard shortcuts for an external keyboard (sic!).
Thus, all conditions have already been created for working in a text editor.
The conditions for more or less comfortable work on the NST itself, which would resemble work on a “genuine” Android device, and in Android 2.1 itself, which would resemble work on Windows, were already created earlier. For this purpose, a number of tweaks were applied.
Tweaks of my nuk.
- The function “back” is assigned to the upper left soft key, the “menu” is assigned to the lower left.
- The central button of the knock brings up a custom window of running applications (an analogue of the taskbar), when double-clicked, it expands the notification panel on which shortcuts to the most needed applications are fixed (an analogue of the Start menu), including, of course, a text editor and readers, and a dictionary, and a file manager, and a browser, and all the necessary settings, as well as a classic full-screen launcher with a list of all installed applications.
Final provisions
The text of this article is in electronic ink.