Close up of a typewriter annex SMS-receiver

Back To The Future Of Texting: SMS On A Panasonic Typewriter

December 18, 2024 by Heidi Ulrich 4 Comments

Among us Hackaday writers, there are quite a few enthusiasts for retro artifacts – and it gets even better when they’re combined in an unusual way. So, when we get a tip about a build like this by [Sam Christy], our hands sure start itching.

The story of this texting typewriter is one that beautifully blends nostalgia and modern technology. [Sam], an engineering teacher, transformed a Panasonic T36 typewriter into a device that can receive SMS messages, print them out, and even display the sender’s name and timestamp. For enthusiasts of retro gadgets, this creation bridges the gap between analog charm and digital convenience.

What makes [Sam]’s hack particularly exciting is its adaptability. By effectively replacing the original keyboard with an ESP32 microcontroller, he designed the setup to work with almost any electric typewriter. The project involves I2C communication, multiplexer circuits, and SMS management via Twilio. The paper feed uses an “infinite” roll of typing paper—something [Sam] humorously notes as outlasting magnetic tape for storage longevity.

Beyond receiving messages, [Sam] is working on features like replying to texts directly from the typewriter. For those still familiar with the art form of typing on a typewriter: how would you elegantly combine these old machines with modern technology? While you’re thinking, don’t overlook part two, which gives a deeper insight in the software behind this marvel!

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This Typewriter Types Toast

May 10, 2024 by Jenny List 28 Comments

As a writer it’s a pleasure to see one’s work appear from time to time on a physical medium. While newspapers may be shuffling slowly off this mortal coil, there are still a few opportunities to write for printed media. It’s safe to say that no Hackaday scribe has ever managed to have their work published on the medium in this hack though, because it’s a typewriter designed to type on toast.

The toaster-typewriter is the work of [Ritika Kedia], and it forms part of her thesis in product design at the Parsons School of Design, New York. It’s written up very much from an artistic rather than a tech perspective, but it’s no less ingenious for that in the way it uses letters formed from hot wire on a clay substrate, mounted on the end of the typewriter arms in front of a toaster.

We’re slightly sad to see that it only has three operable letters at the moment as it’s an artwork rather than a document machine, but we love the idea and wish she had time to develop it further with a full alphabet. You can see a short demo in the video below the break.

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Royal Typewriter Gets A Second (or Third) Life

April 8, 2024 by Al Williams 13 Comments

Usually when we are restoring something with a keyboard, it is some kind of old computer or terminal. But [Make it Kozi] wanted an old-fashioned typewriter. The problem is, as he notes, they are nostalgically popular these days, so picking up a working model can be pricey. The answer? Buy a junker and restore it. You can watch the whole process in the video below, too, but nearly the only sound you’ll hear is the clacking of the keys. He doesn’t say a word until around the 14-minute mark. Just warning you if you have it playing in the background!

Of course, even if you can find a $10 typewriter, it probably won’t be the same kind, nor will it have the same problems. However, it is a good bet that any old mechanical typewriter will need many of the same steps.

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When Is A Typewriter A Printer? When It Has A Parallel Port

December 14, 2023 by Kristina Panos 13 Comments

If you want to talk to a typewriter using something other than your fingers on the keys, you could do a lot worse than to pick up a specimen featuring a Centronics parallel port. That’s what happened to [mlupo], who came across an old Swintec 1146 CMP and decided to hack it into an art installation.

At the push of a giant, clicky button, the typewriter now spits out family stories. This is all thanks to an Adafruit KB2040 keyboard driver being used in a new, exciting way — as a printer driver.

More specifically, the CircuitPython program running on the KB2040 takes in a text file and then sends the data one character at a time until a newline is reached. At that point, the typewriter sends a busy signal and the characters are typed.

As soon as the typewriter is no longer occupied, the data stream picks back up until the next newline or until the file is completely typed out.

Once [mlupo] figured out enough of the parallel port protocol, they were able to build a custom breakout board with the KB2040, a female parallel port, and a row of LEDs for debugging that [mlupo] kept because they look cool.

The KB2040 sets the values high on a series of the parallel port’s data pins, along with the port’s STROBE pin, which pulls low when data is ready. During each STROBE cycle, the high and low pins are read by the Swintec as a binary character.

Of course, you can always use the power of Pi to build your own modern typewriter.

Thanks to [foamyguy] for the tip!

Wandering Through Old Word Processors Yields A Beast

November 18, 2023 by Donald Papp 18 Comments

The world once ran on hardcopy, and when the digital age started to bring new tools and ways of doing things, documents were ripe for change. Today, word processors and digital documents are so ubiquitous that they are hardly worth a thought, but that didn’t happen all at once. [Cathode Ray Dude] has a soft spot for old word processors and the journey they took over decades, and he walks through the Olivetti ETV 2700.

In the days of character displays and no multitasking, WYSIWYG as a concept was still a long ways off.

The ETV 2700 is a monstrous machine; a fusion of old-school word processor, x86-based hardware, and electric 17 inch-wide typewriter.

With it one could boot up a word processor that is nothing like the WYSIWYG of today, write and edit a document, and upon command, the typewriter portion could electronically type out a page. A bit like a printer, but it really is an electric typewriter with a computer interface. Characters were hammered out one at a time with daisy wheel and ink ribbon on a manually-loaded page using all the usual typewriter controls.

While internally the machine has an x86 processor, expects a monitor and even boots MS-DOS, the keyboard had its own layout (and even proprietary keys and functions), did not support graphical output, and in other ways was unusual even by the standards of the oddball decades during which designers and products experimented with figuring out what worked best in terms of functionality and usability.

Nowadays, we see AI-enabled typewriter projects and porting vintage OSes to vintage word processor hardware, but such projects are in some part possible in part thanks to the durability of these devices. The entire video is embedded below, but you can jump directly to what the Olivetti ETV 2700 looked like on the inside if that’s what interests you most.

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Illustrated Kristina with an IBM Model M keyboard floating between her hands.

Keebin’ With Kristina: The One With The Busy Box Macro Pad

September 21, 2023 by Kristina Panos 7 Comments

Well, I must admit that Google Translate completely failed me here, and thus I have no real idea what the trick is to this beautiful, stunning transparent split keyboard by [illness072]. Allegedly, the older tweets (exes?) hold the key to this magic, but again, Google Translate.

Based on top picture, I assume that the answer lies in something like thin white PCB fingers bent to accommodate the row stagger and hiding cleverly behind the keys.

Anyone who can read what I assume is Japanese, please advise what is going on in the comments below.

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Raspi-Powered Typewriter Is A Real MUSE

September 5, 2023 by Kristina Panos 4 Comments

Thanks to parenting and life in general, [Brendan] had fallen out of the habit of writing and wasn’t happy about it. If you write anything ever, you already know there are endless distractions when it comes to doing so on a computer. Sure, there always typewriters, but it’s difficult to do anything with the fruits of a typewriter other than scan it in or make copies, and it’s basically un-editable except by hand.

Instead of just sitting down and writing, [Brendan] did what any of us would do — took the time to create an elegant solution. The Most Unusual Sentence Extractor, or MUSE, is a Raspberry Pi-based typewriter with the best of both worlds. It’s essentially a word processor, but it can save to the cloud.

[Brendan] found beautiful inspiration in the Olympia Traveller de Luxe typewriter, a delightfully boxy affair made in the 1960s and 70s with lovely keys. Starting with a 68Keys.io board, [Brendan] set about re-creating the lines of the Traveller de Luxe in Tinkercad.

Since it doesn’t really need a platen, this was the perfect place to mount a screen using black PVC. At first, [Brendan] was going to use an e-ink screen, but a mishap led to a better solution — an LCD touchscreen that makes document navigation a breeze.

We absolutely love the look of this machine, which was obviously a labor of love. And yeah, it does the trick:[Brendan] is writing again. Though it maybe be inconvenient, we agree that it really is nice to have a dedicated workstation for certain things.

Looking for the complete opposite of this project? How about a Chat GPT-assisted daisywheel typewriter?