Instead of doom-scrolling through my phone in the morning, I built an alternative with a Raspberry Pi, a dot matrix printer, and some PHP.
  • Hotspur@lemmy.mlEnglish
    2·
    41 minutes ago

    Man, I wonder if it’s challenging to source a steady supply of paper for that thing…

  • essteeyou@lemmy.worldEnglish
    71·
    1 hour ago

    I was interested until I hit this sentence:

    I use PHP as my language of choice in a day-to-day basis, and this is no exception.

  • cmnybo@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
    1·
    47 minutes ago

    I can’t stand the screeching of a dot matrix printer. The correct way to print the news is with a teletype.

  • geekwithsoul@lemm.eeEnglish
    1·
    1 hour ago

    So, a newspaper with a lot of extra steps? I understand the gee whizness of getting this all to work but not really sure there’s a solid “why” to this.

      • geekwithsoul@lemm.eeEnglish
        31·
        1 hour ago

        Maybe? But in the article he was talking about his priority being that he wanted to disconnect from his phone but still wanted news. Just seems there’s been a solution for that for a few centuries now. His solution seemed to me at least to be a lemon that wasn’t worth the squeeze as it were.

        • Praise Idleness@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          1·
          15 minutes ago

          So there was two solutions for them:

          1. No-code, paid and pre-made
          2. DIY script writing, free(except materials) and custom built to suit personal needs

          I choose 2.

        • jqubed@lemmy.worldEnglish
          1·
          34 minutes ago

          I’m assuming they still print newspapers, but I can’t remember when I last saw our local paper for sale at a store. The vending machines are long gone.