E-ink displays haven’t revolutionized the world so much as served us humbly in e-book readers such as the Kindle and its ilk. Most such readers are designed for extended sessions reading novels and the like, but [Roni Bandini] decided a haiku-sized device was in order.
The diminutive device runs off an ESP32, which has plenty of clock cycles for easily driving displays. It’s paired with a 2.9 inch Waveshare e-ink display, upon which it delivers poetry in the popular Japanese haiku format – 5 syllables, 7 syllables, 5 syllables. Writing to the display is easy with the GxEPD library, which is compatible with a variety of common e-ink displays. Presently the poetry is hardcoded in the program, and there’s plenty that could be included with the ESP32’s roomy program storage. However, [Roni] notes it would be simple to have the reader pull poems from an SD card instead.
It’s a fun project, and a great way to get familiar with the basics of working with e-ink displays. We’d love to see a WiFi-enabled version that pulls down the hottest daily haikus fresh from the web, too. Funnily enough, our own archives only feature one other reference to the famous Japanese art, which has little to do with poetry. If you fancy changing that, make something relevant and drop us a line. Video after the break.
A daily haiku would be a cool project for the Adafruit Mag Tag, and probably less depressing than my current covid-19 stat tracker.
Why are you hurting yourself with the stats man, I stopped watching the news more than a year ago, and I’ve seen a non negligeable improvement in my mood, honest
575 syllables?
But a Hackaday poem
Should use 555
5 7 5 syllables
But a Hackaday poem
Must use 555
I want to love this
But I don’t understand how
You say syllables
5, 7, then 5
but a Hackaday poem
must use 555
But what if you prefer using a 556
Or does that just double the line count?
Virus weather day
Haiku reader is programmed
Perfect Snow-Vid play
In unknowing ways
Your poem has really brightened
A boring Sunday
My favorite haiku:
Haikus are easy
But sometimes they don’t make sense
Refrigerator
My favorite too
Written by Mister James May
Our man in Japan
Old timers may remember Spam haiku, back in the 1980s or whenever, before spam meant junk email and the poems were strictly about the meat. Many were very funny.