Something I’ve noticed in a few friends and family members is that there’s this whole hobby of setting up to be productive but not actually being productive. One person has a brilliantly laid out workshop with so many custom built shelves and cleats and jigs and tables, but about 90% of the woodworking they’ve done is the workshop itself. Another spends ton of time figuring out the absolute best way to organize her recipes and todo lists and desk and organizers and pens and finding the right foot rest, but that’s about it.
And I can see her being really into this device as an idea, but I would bet all the money in my pockets that she’d never actually use it.
None of this is a critique on these individuals, or how well this PDA performs at being a productivity device. It’s just this meta layer of productivity I’m noticing around me more and more.
People just want their quirky single purpose gadgets back. Tech got kind of boring after a laptop and phone do everything.
I kind of want the device in the OP, assuming it's cheap enough. Not because I think it will be more productive, but because it would be fun to pull out a Nintendo DS shaped device to note tasks down.
I notice this a lot too, and try to avoid falling into this trap. But also, if it’s a hobby, maybe it’s ok? Maybe the organisation is the fun part for some people.
This is why after 25 years of using Linux I have finally come around to just using vanilla Ubuntu, with mostly defaults. Playing with Linux is one of the biggest timewasting hobbies I’ve ever had, although I did learn a thing or two.
> Something I’ve noticed in a few friends and family members is that there’s this whole hobby of setting up to be productive but not actually being productive
This is also most programmers. Lots of time spent picking languages, configuring tools, switching frameworks, updating dependencies, etc. Very little time making useful code.
I have the same feeling about a lot of productivity tooling in the software world. At one point I had been convinced by several people that I needed to be taking notes, either handwritten or have some kind of note taking system. I tried for a good amount of time (2 years) before concluding that it's not for me. I'm more productive without notes, my mind seems fairly well organised. My biggest enemy is procrastination, not disorganisation.
So that's all well and good. I don't believe that my way is the one true way, I think each to their own. What I don't like is that people won't stop telling you about their note taking systems and that you should take notes. Well, things have calmed down a bit now, but a few years ago it felt like people would actively hunt you down and force their note taking opinion on you if they suspected you didn't keep your own knowledge base.
Did anyone convince you to pay for a remarkable? ;)
It's managed to fill a niche for me, but no magical experience and probably not worth the price. In retrospect, I was "keeping up" with wealthier coworkers.
Yep, I've got a remarkable gathering dust in a drawer. And I really tried to make that one work given the cost. I did find some niche uses for it, like drawing to scale when doing some garden planning, or using it for writing music. But they were both temporary things and I could have just used paper or a dedicated app for the purpose for far less money.
(edit) That one is on me though, I genuinely thought it would be a neat bit of tech, and I am glad I tried it because I think I'd still be considering it otherwise.
As a person who easily falls for "preparing" over doing the work, I committed to the hipster PDA [1] as an antidote to this for many years: "the Hipster PDA comprises a sheaf of index cards held together with a binder clip."
My pocket index cards haven't run out of VC money or instituted a new subscription model yet!
Fellow index card productivity hacker here, do have a plan to start numbering and indexing them in a databasing drawer system. Thankfully, have not had time to implement this one just yet.
The workshop hits home. One of the decisions I made was to let my workshop grow organically around me based on what I'm doing. I started with a pile of junk tools on an Ikea table in an empty basement. By focusing on just what I needed at the time I ended up with fully equipped metal, wood and coating shops without ever consciously building them. They just sort of happened based on the needs of the next project.
I’ve done something similar - usually buying tools only when I need them, or when I find something I’ve been thinking about at a great deal used.
I do periodically however take time to straighten, arrange, and fix workflow / storage issues.
(This became important when I purchased at auction from a hardware store closing down 30+ 3 foot tall of bins of hardware - the exact ones used for display in the store - still filled ).
My dream productivity device is a modern take on a Psion 5MX.
I don't mean I want a Psion 5MX with a bunch of hacks to keep it running - I've seen that, no thanks.
I want the same great keyboard, same form factor, some ergonomics, but with a modern screen (mono/e-ink is fine), modern CPU, modern connectivity (wifi, bluetooth, usb-c, maybe 4G/5G eSIM if we're being fancy), and improved battery life with usb-c charging.
The first thing that goes with all these geek PDAs and mini form-factors is the keyboard. I want to be able to type a short email, I want to be able to ssh into a server and use vim (so, yeah, ESC is needed or ability to remap caps lock or something), and also do some basic doc writing and perhaps a spreadsheet or two. A web browser would be nice.
I don't need apps. I don't need a compressed desktop. I don't need games. It's a productivity device.
Thinking about it as I type this, perhaps a psion-style keyboard for an iPhone might hit the spot if I figure out the right focus mode setup in iOS for when I need that mode. Maybe.
I'm glad this hits the spot for some people... but that keyboard... no thanks.
> "My dream productivity device is a modern take on a Psion 5MX."
Adapt it out of the conventions of the inferior form factor by making it a detachable, i. e. a UMPC in a smartphone-like form factor, and you might have a winner... if you don't skimp on all the other good stuff that makes a great ultra-portable general-purpose computing platform.
> "Thinking about it as I type this, perhaps a psion-style keyboard for an iPhone might hit the spot [...]."
The problem with the iPhone is that it's not a UMPC, but locked-down crap.
Just looked up their stuff again (it's been a while) and they appear to be out of business, although the website is still running. Don't order from them, based on Reddit reviews... Real shame, I loved the Psion keyboard.
I want an updated Psion too. Either that or a modern TRS-80 Model 100. Something that can run for hundreds or maybe thousands of hours on 4 AA batteries (the original could do 30 or so hours). Something without an app SDK and definitely without a browser.
This is a very strange nitpick. I don't think many people at all would consider the Arduino libraries to be an OS. The UI, apps, usage of the dual screen, keyboard, and scroll pad are more than enough to make calling it a custom OS reasonable. Just because they didn't write their own filesystem and related tooling.
#1: This is fantastic from a conceptual perspective! Focus on simple computing tasks that are important, without distractions, ads etc. Open source, kit, looks well-designed.
#2: I've programmed and used those EPD displays (The same model used here I believe specifically). They are neither a joy to program, or use. The programming is much more complicated than a normal display because of how you manage refreshes: Partial, full, when to do each etc. The latter because, as you can see in the video, the latency is high.
I think responsivity and latency are one of the most important things for a pleasant user experience. We as engineers and developers have failed at this in general over the past ~2 decades. I think a device like this that breaks conventions is in a nice spot to also break this trend. Especially not using an OS (Or using an RTOS?), there should be no perceptible latency, if he changes to a normal display. I could tolerate a display like this for some uses and like a static sensor that runs on battery, but for an interactive device like this? No.
It really shouldn't be. Other threads have mentioned the Psion 5. That came out almost 30 years ago and could get 20 hours on a pair of AA batteries. A similar modern device should be able to get 200+ hours on a pair of AA batteries. For typical PDA use, that should be many months of use.
your phone, laptop and cellphone (Mar 5, 2003 by scott williams)
the hiptop is the coolest thing ever. the web browser is surprisingly nice to use. the phone is slightly awkward, but usable. email is a dream. the web has almost all the features of ie. bookmarks, homepage, recent pages and a url capture for email. the browser is a wee bit slower than a 56k. as a phone, the speaker is plenty loud enough. I do not like headsets, so I always hold the phone to my ear. at first, the phone was awkward to hold, but after a few calls I actually found I liked it better than previous phones. the larger size made it somewhat easier to hold. no hand cramping like with a se t68i. that said, the phone isn't tiny, but doesn't feel like a brick either. the screen, while small is very easy to read. the backlight is the nice calm blue. very nice. the keypad is small but not too small. it took me about two days to get used to typing text messages on a qwerty keypad. so after having the sidekick for a week I will never have another phone again. well, maybe when the new color one comes out. it does everything but the laundry. and I wrote this on the sidekick too.
That device hit a sweet spot the Palm, Blackberry, and WinCE phones hadn't, and iPhone didn't for a while* either (maybe still hasn't, depending on the importance of the mechanical and tactile UX).
Oh yeah, Danger, Inc. was cofounded by Andy Rubin, who would become the author of Android.
---
* Early on, people purchased case sleeves for iPhone with tactile keyboards. It took Apple a while to tune the haptic and prediction to hide how relatively poor iPhone keyboards initially were compared to a Blackberry or Sidekick. Even now: https://www.clicks.tech/
Productivity usually refers to enabling people to be productive through planning. Which includes calendar, todo lists, text editors, file managment, etc. This seems to fit in that category.
There's definitely a separation between the definition and perception. When I watched the video, my first thought was "This device is very cool but I can't imagine myself ever using it". There's hundreds, if not thousands of infinitely more convenient scheduling/productivity tools compared to having what is basically a small raspberry pi in my pocket for manual task entry. There is definitely a market for this, albeit it a very small, niche one. To me this is akin to writing a paper in word compared to pulling out a mini typewriter.
A workshop full of tools is worthless if you never use them.
Modern phones and web browsers are full of weaponized distractions with billions of dollars in forces fighting to steal your attention. To actually be productive, many (most?) people benefit from a device that does less.
It's why reMarkable is vastly superior to eInk Android tablets that do "more". It's why some people have switched to cameras instead of phone cameras and to other analog technologies - be it a paper notebook or what have you.
Fewer tools but fewer distractions beats many tools and push notifications.
I guess it depends on how you like to work. I hate working on devices. I have an iPhone Mini, two laptops, a pc I built, a Remarkable, a work iPad, a TV.
I use 4-5 of these devices for mostly writing comments online and writing various mediums of comedy. I do other creative work on my personal devices but I have found I enjoy doing more with my hands and body as well.
For example, often when I am stuck on writing I go for a walk. I often don’t take my phone and force myself to focus only on the problem at hand. I often take a notebook and write any notes about my conclusions along the walk. Eventually the notes make it back into a computer.
I also enjoy cooking and can use my device to look up recipes or order food online and avoid cooking all together. But I choose to use the stack of throw away desk calendar paper to write down my grocery list and go to the store without my phone. I choose to chop the broccoli and carrots even though I cab buy a bag of pre steamed for less. I even keep a passive grocery list on my phone in reminders app. But I still do the ritual. Not at all because it’s productive.
But what I really enjoy about life and creating is not sitting at a desk by myself hammering the ideas and draining myself reading, reading, reading. And I like to read but a lot of reading these days is distraction and those devices are designed to be distracting. So much that I go out of my way to prevent them from distracting me and keeping me in a sitting position.
With a little device dedicated for productivity I gain the benefits of computing without all the distracting tracking, “use my product!” Side effects.
And do it because you have agency to do it. Living your life with productivity doesn’t mean being an efficiency slave.
At the end of the day I still may be middle/lower class consumer cattle. But at least I am cattle with agency.
My first thought was “I’m glad this has progressed and looking slimmer, this inspires me to investigate building the 4-inch square device of my dreams.”
Congrats on making a product. I see the appeal of these products because they embrace the productive aspects of technology and prevent the intrusive attention seeking technologies from being involved.
The reason I would not get a device like this is because the device I have is already capable of doing all this. The problems that hamper my productivity are psychological and unless I’m going to completely get rid of all the devices and thoughts that are distracting me, I don’t see how another device is going to help me. In fact, I can see me being more unproductive just trying to get every little thing right with synchronization and using the product versus just doing the thing I should be productive at.
I really do like the aesthetic though. It’s a hell of a thing to build your own hardware and software and I hope it helps others and can grow.
I reckon that all these "productive" takes on smartphones don't really solve the issue, they end up being too "dumb". The one big thing that makes smartphones addictive is not all the apps: it's the big beautiful piece of glass at the front.
The screen is what makes smartphones addictive. You can tell just by looking at the history of them. So my ideal productivity device would be a smartphone underneath - full android, great cameras, decent processor - but the screen would be small and rubbish. Let me do everything I want to do, just make it unpleasant to do it unless I really need to.
I’m under the impression that the main problem of cellphone addiction is that stuff like short form video is too addictive—YouTube, and then TikTok just made it worse.
IMO an e-ink (or whatever it is, black and white and, I think it is non-emissive?) screen with a small text-only OLED display is pretty good. But, to be called a productivity device, it needs a bigger screen and a full keyboard.
This thing is a PDA. Which is fine. But a PDA is an organization and communication device, right? Not productivity.
Making it unpleasant to use seems like a mistake. Productivity requires ergonomics, and ergonomic things are pleasant to use, there’s no getting around it. But we can maybe kill off the flashiness.
An e-ink display allows me to get sucked into reading on my phone. It eliminates half my time-sinks but makes the other half a little nicer. A device with a bad screen would make my productivity go up overall, but I wouldn't be using the device to do any work.
So perhaps what's needed for productivity on the device itself is in fact a much bigger screen. Those "tri-fold" phones might be big enough, if you could somehow also fit a usable keyboard in your pocket along with the phone.
It's so easy to get sucked in to scrolling short videos. You can uninstall the apps which makes it a bit better. The worst offender is Youtube which I keep for music but can't remove shorts from.
Neat concept. It’d be interesting to do a spin on it that expands it to a 12”/13” footprint, allowing it to have a full keyboard, making it thinner (since components can be spread out), and making it more practical for tasks like writing. Think something like the defunct 12” MacBook, but with a minimal UI reminiscent of an 80s Mac on a grayscale display.
There are e-ink tablets that can have a keyboard attached to them that kinda approximate that, but I’ve always found the KB-tablet-stand form factor clunky at best, and they tend to run some Android derivative which is going to feel slow compared to “bare metal” software running on an SBC.
The larger alternative that comes to mind is the ClockworkPI [0] uConsole and DevTerm devices, although they seem to have poor availability or long and variable lead times. Beyond that you're into touching distance of x86 laptops with the GPD Win type micro PCs.
Need a price to know if I will buy. I doubt you would cover R&D at >$1000, could easily be >$100 unit cost for a short run, but more complex watches can be <$10 strait from China.
I wonder if they can set it up so that orders for the freer world never touches the grabby hands of the (economic-)molester: produce the parts in China, if the buyer is outside of the US, ship directly to them..
Whereas for US orders, maybe offer a delivery to hotels in case the buyer is having a trip outside of the country? (Presumably it's not a sustainable idea, there'd be just a handful of people wanting to buy this product who'd happen to be travelling out of the country soonish)
Problem is if the maker is in the US, it's going to be hard to pull that off. You'd need an external company to manage everything. Bulk ordering the parts, resin printing the case, making the PCBs, and boxing it all in a kit.
Dream product pshaw, let me click on this ohhhh shit I want one.
Well sort of. I have wanted a Sony Client PEG-UX50 for ages, if it had a proper modern hardware and OS. Some of the other Clie form factors would make amazing and geeky phones.
I really miss the mobile device era where big names tried random shit to see what people would buy. These days, everything is basically an iPhone. And to be fair, Apple is now mostly an iPhone company.
Something I’ve noticed in a few friends and family members is that there’s this whole hobby of setting up to be productive but not actually being productive. One person has a brilliantly laid out workshop with so many custom built shelves and cleats and jigs and tables, but about 90% of the woodworking they’ve done is the workshop itself. Another spends ton of time figuring out the absolute best way to organize her recipes and todo lists and desk and organizers and pens and finding the right foot rest, but that’s about it.
And I can see her being really into this device as an idea, but I would bet all the money in my pockets that she’d never actually use it.
None of this is a critique on these individuals, or how well this PDA performs at being a productivity device. It’s just this meta layer of productivity I’m noticing around me more and more.
Lots of music producers fall into this trap too. So much so that I'm convinced nearly the entire synthesizer industry is setup to exploit this.
People just want their quirky single purpose gadgets back. Tech got kind of boring after a laptop and phone do everything.
I kind of want the device in the OP, assuming it's cheap enough. Not because I think it will be more productive, but because it would be fun to pull out a Nintendo DS shaped device to note tasks down.
I notice this a lot too, and try to avoid falling into this trap. But also, if it’s a hobby, maybe it’s ok? Maybe the organisation is the fun part for some people.
Tweaking Linux to make it work just the way I like isn't something I do towards some greater purpose, I enjoy it for its own sake.
This is why after 25 years of using Linux I have finally come around to just using vanilla Ubuntu, with mostly defaults. Playing with Linux is one of the biggest timewasting hobbies I’ve ever had, although I did learn a thing or two.
Ah yes, a sudomasochist.
> Something I’ve noticed in a few friends and family members is that there’s this whole hobby of setting up to be productive but not actually being productive
This is also most programmers. Lots of time spent picking languages, configuring tools, switching frameworks, updating dependencies, etc. Very little time making useful code.
It's a matter of goals and perspective then, eh?
Maybe the workshop is what brings them the most joy about the hobby.
Maybe the recipe person appreciates their collection this way.
Maybe they don't frame things in terms of productivity, like you do (even if they do use that word).
I have the same feeling about a lot of productivity tooling in the software world. At one point I had been convinced by several people that I needed to be taking notes, either handwritten or have some kind of note taking system. I tried for a good amount of time (2 years) before concluding that it's not for me. I'm more productive without notes, my mind seems fairly well organised. My biggest enemy is procrastination, not disorganisation.
So that's all well and good. I don't believe that my way is the one true way, I think each to their own. What I don't like is that people won't stop telling you about their note taking systems and that you should take notes. Well, things have calmed down a bit now, but a few years ago it felt like people would actively hunt you down and force their note taking opinion on you if they suspected you didn't keep your own knowledge base.
Did anyone convince you to pay for a remarkable? ;)
It's managed to fill a niche for me, but no magical experience and probably not worth the price. In retrospect, I was "keeping up" with wealthier coworkers.
Yep, I've got a remarkable gathering dust in a drawer. And I really tried to make that one work given the cost. I did find some niche uses for it, like drawing to scale when doing some garden planning, or using it for writing music. But they were both temporary things and I could have just used paper or a dedicated app for the purpose for far less money.
(edit) That one is on me though, I genuinely thought it would be a neat bit of tech, and I am glad I tried it because I think I'd still be considering it otherwise.
As a person who easily falls for "preparing" over doing the work, I committed to the hipster PDA [1] as an antidote to this for many years: "the Hipster PDA comprises a sheaf of index cards held together with a binder clip."
My pocket index cards haven't run out of VC money or instituted a new subscription model yet!
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hipster_PDA
Fellow index card productivity hacker here, do have a plan to start numbering and indexing them in a databasing drawer system. Thankfully, have not had time to implement this one just yet.
Sounds similar to a lot of discussion around note taking and other productivity software.
The workshop hits home. One of the decisions I made was to let my workshop grow organically around me based on what I'm doing. I started with a pile of junk tools on an Ikea table in an empty basement. By focusing on just what I needed at the time I ended up with fully equipped metal, wood and coating shops without ever consciously building them. They just sort of happened based on the needs of the next project.
This is overall a pretty good strategy.
I’ve done something similar - usually buying tools only when I need them, or when I find something I’ve been thinking about at a great deal used.
I do periodically however take time to straighten, arrange, and fix workflow / storage issues.
(This became important when I purchased at auction from a hardware store closing down 30+ 3 foot tall of bins of hardware - the exact ones used for display in the store - still filled ).
That's because yak shaving is fun. The stuff that follows maybe not.
Procrastination is a huge market. HN should charge.
My dream productivity device is a modern take on a Psion 5MX.
I don't mean I want a Psion 5MX with a bunch of hacks to keep it running - I've seen that, no thanks.
I want the same great keyboard, same form factor, some ergonomics, but with a modern screen (mono/e-ink is fine), modern CPU, modern connectivity (wifi, bluetooth, usb-c, maybe 4G/5G eSIM if we're being fancy), and improved battery life with usb-c charging.
The first thing that goes with all these geek PDAs and mini form-factors is the keyboard. I want to be able to type a short email, I want to be able to ssh into a server and use vim (so, yeah, ESC is needed or ability to remap caps lock or something), and also do some basic doc writing and perhaps a spreadsheet or two. A web browser would be nice.
I don't need apps. I don't need a compressed desktop. I don't need games. It's a productivity device.
Thinking about it as I type this, perhaps a psion-style keyboard for an iPhone might hit the spot if I figure out the right focus mode setup in iOS for when I need that mode. Maybe.
I'm glad this hits the spot for some people... but that keyboard... no thanks.
> "My dream productivity device is a modern take on a Psion 5MX."
Adapt it out of the conventions of the inferior form factor by making it a detachable, i. e. a UMPC in a smartphone-like form factor, and you might have a winner... if you don't skimp on all the other good stuff that makes a great ultra-portable general-purpose computing platform.
> "Thinking about it as I type this, perhaps a psion-style keyboard for an iPhone might hit the spot [...]."
The problem with the iPhone is that it's not a UMPC, but locked-down crap.
Take a look at Plant Computers PDAs: https://www.www3.planetcom.co.uk/planetphones . The hardware is a bit old notre and if love to see a refresh, but the Pison keyboard is there!
Just looked up their stuff again (it's been a while) and they appear to be out of business, although the website is still running. Don't order from them, based on Reddit reviews... Real shame, I loved the Psion keyboard.
I want an updated Psion too. Either that or a modern TRS-80 Model 100. Something that can run for hundreds or maybe thousands of hours on 4 AA batteries (the original could do 30 or so hours). Something without an app SDK and definitely without a browser.
Spoiler: it's PocketMage, home-made PDA based on ESP32.
Github says "custom OS", but it's more like "custom UI", it's actually Arduino-based and relies on Arduino libraries for all OS-like functionality.
https://github.com/ashtf8/EinkPDA
This is a very strange nitpick. I don't think many people at all would consider the Arduino libraries to be an OS. The UI, apps, usage of the dual screen, keyboard, and scroll pad are more than enough to make calling it a custom OS reasonable. Just because they didn't write their own filesystem and related tooling.
#1: This is fantastic from a conceptual perspective! Focus on simple computing tasks that are important, without distractions, ads etc. Open source, kit, looks well-designed.
#2: I've programmed and used those EPD displays (The same model used here I believe specifically). They are neither a joy to program, or use. The programming is much more complicated than a normal display because of how you manage refreshes: Partial, full, when to do each etc. The latter because, as you can see in the video, the latency is high.
I think responsivity and latency are one of the most important things for a pleasant user experience. We as engineers and developers have failed at this in general over the past ~2 decades. I think a device like this that breaks conventions is in a nice spot to also break this trend. Especially not using an OS (Or using an RTOS?), there should be no perceptible latency, if he changes to a normal display. I could tolerate a display like this for some uses and like a static sensor that runs on battery, but for an interactive device like this? No.
Battery life is a trade off though. The removable / replaceable battery is great too.
> Battery life is a trade off though
It really shouldn't be. Other threads have mentioned the Psion 5. That came out almost 30 years ago and could get 20 hours on a pair of AA batteries. A similar modern device should be able to get 200+ hours on a pair of AA batteries. For typical PDA use, that should be many months of use.
I really love that electronics is at the point that people are able to create their dream device.
I'm wanting to do that too but don't have the skills.
Gaining those skills through doing is a worthwhile and interesting journey. And it can be done incrementally.
So, Danger Hiptop aka T-Mobile Sidekick.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T-Mobile_Sidekick
A review from 2003:
your phone, laptop and cellphone (Mar 5, 2003 by scott williams)
the hiptop is the coolest thing ever. the web browser is surprisingly nice to use. the phone is slightly awkward, but usable. email is a dream. the web has almost all the features of ie. bookmarks, homepage, recent pages and a url capture for email. the browser is a wee bit slower than a 56k. as a phone, the speaker is plenty loud enough. I do not like headsets, so I always hold the phone to my ear. at first, the phone was awkward to hold, but after a few calls I actually found I liked it better than previous phones. the larger size made it somewhat easier to hold. no hand cramping like with a se t68i. that said, the phone isn't tiny, but doesn't feel like a brick either. the screen, while small is very easy to read. the backlight is the nice calm blue. very nice. the keypad is small but not too small. it took me about two days to get used to typing text messages on a qwerty keypad. so after having the sidekick for a week I will never have another phone again. well, maybe when the new color one comes out. it does everything but the laundry. and I wrote this on the sidekick too.
That device hit a sweet spot the Palm, Blackberry, and WinCE phones hadn't, and iPhone didn't for a while* either (maybe still hasn't, depending on the importance of the mechanical and tactile UX).
Oh yeah, Danger, Inc. was cofounded by Andy Rubin, who would become the author of Android.
---
* Early on, people purchased case sleeves for iPhone with tactile keyboards. It took Apple a while to tune the haptic and prediction to hide how relatively poor iPhone keyboards initially were compared to a Blackberry or Sidekick. Even now: https://www.clicks.tech/
why are so many things with "productivity" in the name for the opposite? Not that there's a problem with fun but why market it this way?
What is unproductive about this device?
Productivity usually refers to enabling people to be productive through planning. Which includes calendar, todo lists, text editors, file managment, etc. This seems to fit in that category.
The keyboard is too small. Can it even fit vim? It is impossible to be productive without vim.
There's definitely a separation between the definition and perception. When I watched the video, my first thought was "This device is very cool but I can't imagine myself ever using it". There's hundreds, if not thousands of infinitely more convenient scheduling/productivity tools compared to having what is basically a small raspberry pi in my pocket for manual task entry. There is definitely a market for this, albeit it a very small, niche one. To me this is akin to writing a paper in word compared to pulling out a mini typewriter.
A workshop full of tools is worthless if you never use them.
Modern phones and web browsers are full of weaponized distractions with billions of dollars in forces fighting to steal your attention. To actually be productive, many (most?) people benefit from a device that does less.
It's why reMarkable is vastly superior to eInk Android tablets that do "more". It's why some people have switched to cameras instead of phone cameras and to other analog technologies - be it a paper notebook or what have you.
Fewer tools but fewer distractions beats many tools and push notifications.
I guess it depends on how you like to work. I hate working on devices. I have an iPhone Mini, two laptops, a pc I built, a Remarkable, a work iPad, a TV.
I use 4-5 of these devices for mostly writing comments online and writing various mediums of comedy. I do other creative work on my personal devices but I have found I enjoy doing more with my hands and body as well.
For example, often when I am stuck on writing I go for a walk. I often don’t take my phone and force myself to focus only on the problem at hand. I often take a notebook and write any notes about my conclusions along the walk. Eventually the notes make it back into a computer.
I also enjoy cooking and can use my device to look up recipes or order food online and avoid cooking all together. But I choose to use the stack of throw away desk calendar paper to write down my grocery list and go to the store without my phone. I choose to chop the broccoli and carrots even though I cab buy a bag of pre steamed for less. I even keep a passive grocery list on my phone in reminders app. But I still do the ritual. Not at all because it’s productive.
But what I really enjoy about life and creating is not sitting at a desk by myself hammering the ideas and draining myself reading, reading, reading. And I like to read but a lot of reading these days is distraction and those devices are designed to be distracting. So much that I go out of my way to prevent them from distracting me and keeping me in a sitting position.
With a little device dedicated for productivity I gain the benefits of computing without all the distracting tracking, “use my product!” Side effects.
And do it because you have agency to do it. Living your life with productivity doesn’t mean being an efficiency slave.
At the end of the day I still may be middle/lower class consumer cattle. But at least I am cattle with agency.
My first thought was “I’m glad this has progressed and looking slimmer, this inspires me to investigate building the 4-inch square device of my dreams.”
Limitation breeds creativity.
Congrats on making a product. I see the appeal of these products because they embrace the productive aspects of technology and prevent the intrusive attention seeking technologies from being involved.
The reason I would not get a device like this is because the device I have is already capable of doing all this. The problems that hamper my productivity are psychological and unless I’m going to completely get rid of all the devices and thoughts that are distracting me, I don’t see how another device is going to help me. In fact, I can see me being more unproductive just trying to get every little thing right with synchronization and using the product versus just doing the thing I should be productive at.
I really do like the aesthetic though. It’s a hell of a thing to build your own hardware and software and I hope it helps others and can grow.
I reckon that all these "productive" takes on smartphones don't really solve the issue, they end up being too "dumb". The one big thing that makes smartphones addictive is not all the apps: it's the big beautiful piece of glass at the front.
The screen is what makes smartphones addictive. You can tell just by looking at the history of them. So my ideal productivity device would be a smartphone underneath - full android, great cameras, decent processor - but the screen would be small and rubbish. Let me do everything I want to do, just make it unpleasant to do it unless I really need to.
I’m under the impression that the main problem of cellphone addiction is that stuff like short form video is too addictive—YouTube, and then TikTok just made it worse.
IMO an e-ink (or whatever it is, black and white and, I think it is non-emissive?) screen with a small text-only OLED display is pretty good. But, to be called a productivity device, it needs a bigger screen and a full keyboard.
This thing is a PDA. Which is fine. But a PDA is an organization and communication device, right? Not productivity.
Making it unpleasant to use seems like a mistake. Productivity requires ergonomics, and ergonomic things are pleasant to use, there’s no getting around it. But we can maybe kill off the flashiness.
An e-ink display allows me to get sucked into reading on my phone. It eliminates half my time-sinks but makes the other half a little nicer. A device with a bad screen would make my productivity go up overall, but I wouldn't be using the device to do any work.
So perhaps what's needed for productivity on the device itself is in fact a much bigger screen. Those "tri-fold" phones might be big enough, if you could somehow also fit a usable keyboard in your pocket along with the phone.
I wonder if what we need is a device that only allows internet access to search ARXIV and get emails, or something.
It's so easy to get sucked in to scrolling short videos. You can uninstall the apps which makes it a bit better. The worst offender is Youtube which I keep for music but can't remove shorts from.
Neat concept. It’d be interesting to do a spin on it that expands it to a 12”/13” footprint, allowing it to have a full keyboard, making it thinner (since components can be spread out), and making it more practical for tasks like writing. Think something like the defunct 12” MacBook, but with a minimal UI reminiscent of an 80s Mac on a grayscale display.
There are e-ink tablets that can have a keyboard attached to them that kinda approximate that, but I’ve always found the KB-tablet-stand form factor clunky at best, and they tend to run some Android derivative which is going to feel slow compared to “bare metal” software running on an SBC.
The larger alternative that comes to mind is the ClockworkPI [0] uConsole and DevTerm devices, although they seem to have poor availability or long and variable lead times. Beyond that you're into touching distance of x86 laptops with the GPD Win type micro PCs.
[0] https://www.clockworkpi.com/
I remember seeing flexibl eink displays maybe 15 years ago. iirc it rolled up into a toothpaste sized tube. That would be super cool.
Need a price to know if I will buy. I doubt you would cover R&D at >$1000, could easily be >$100 unit cost for a short run, but more complex watches can be <$10 strait from China.
I really just want something under 50 bucks with a keyboard that can chat over wifi.
Not LoraWAN, not Bluetooth.
The Nintendo DS is honestly probably the product you are looking for in that case. There is probably even some weird keyboard accessory for it.
My second thought was “Will this kind of project be dead once tariffs hit in the USA?”
I wonder if they can set it up so that orders for the freer world never touches the grabby hands of the (economic-)molester: produce the parts in China, if the buyer is outside of the US, ship directly to them..
Whereas for US orders, maybe offer a delivery to hotels in case the buyer is having a trip outside of the country? (Presumably it's not a sustainable idea, there'd be just a handful of people wanting to buy this product who'd happen to be travelling out of the country soonish)
Problem is if the maker is in the US, it's going to be hard to pull that off. You'd need an external company to manage everything. Bulk ordering the parts, resin printing the case, making the PCBs, and boxing it all in a kit.
This looks amazing except the number of keys seems too small.
I have been amazed by how few you can get away with once you start using modes/layers.
Dream product pshaw, let me click on this ohhhh shit I want one.
Well sort of. I have wanted a Sony Client PEG-UX50 for ages, if it had a proper modern hardware and OS. Some of the other Clie form factors would make amazing and geeky phones.
I really miss the mobile device era where big names tried random shit to see what people would buy. These days, everything is basically an iPhone. And to be fair, Apple is now mostly an iPhone company.
I recently bought an HP Jornada that I want to explore a little further. Cool little Windows CE palmtop with great battery life.