Building My Connected Shower | Hacker News Reader

Building My Connected Shower

medium.com

24 pointsviacoffee18 comments

So it's a stock projector pointed at a wall at an off perspective.

My thoughts on this kind of thing have always been more like "put a tablet in a waterproof container and suction cup it to the outside of a glass shower".

Apparently you can get shower curtains that have a transparent tablet pouch for a similar effect: http://www.hammacher.com/Product/Default.aspx?sku=83858

Cool projects! Reminds me of this guys bathroom mirror, and makes me think people spend too much time in the bathroom in the morning :)

https://medium.com/@maxbraun/my-bathroom-mirror-is-smarter-t...

There's just nothing like a nice, relaxing 45 minute shower sometimes.

I kinda like the smart mirror one. I used to use a mirror as a white board. Track some basic things like physical stats like weekly weight tracking, daily exercising tracking (check if I did, none if I didn't, very visible since I saw it literally every day), and some todo information. A smart mirror could be nice, and doesn't necessarily mean you spend too much time in front of it.

For instance, I never turn on my television in the morning (I barely make it to the kitchen to pull out something for breakfast). Having an immediate dashboard showing the weather, my day's events, reflecting some stats off of fitbit or a smart scale, could be a really cool tool for just improving information visibility, and making it immediately apparent that you are (or are not) doing what you intend to do and keeping you on track. And harder to back out of than an .org agenda file or my mirror-as-whiteboard routine due to reduced UI friction.

Lovely write-up and I think the project itself sounds very interesting. Using 'hobby' ideas to enhance skills and learn new pathways to implementation. I can totally dig it and glad I got to see it through here. Makes me think I should probably try and follow some DIY-oriented aggregators here and there.

how do you deal with the steam? The condensation will fog up the projector lens. And that environment is not good for the projector innards at all.

The first touted feature of the projector is "Fully sealed design, efficient heat dissipation pathways". But more than that, its only $34. So essentially disposable.

I think the idea is neat but the bigger concern I have is that if I had one, it would cause me to linger in the shower wasting water and power (to heat that water) which might be scarce and expensive in some localities.

> it would cause me to linger in the shower wasting water and power (to heat that water) which might be scarce and expensive in some localities.

Isn't that like the old "finish your vegetables, there are starving children in Africa" adage? Just because there's a water shortage in Peru doesn't mean that it makes any given sense for you to skimp on your water usage.

It's not a matter of water consumption, but of cost due to power consumption.

If you're adding a projector and computer to your shower routine, you aren't too concerned about power usage.

The electricity used by those will be dwarfed by the energy used to heat the incoming water. A large electric tankless heater (served by a 240VAC/100A and drawing 18kW) can supply a 2gpm showerhead.

Compare that to a computer and PJ, several of which can be comfortably serviced by a single 120VAC/15A circuit.

And many people, like my parents, have a well. So the water just goes back into the ground for it to be sucked out again anyway :)

Yes and no. The vegetables thing was always somewhat silly, because the vegetables on a plate in the US had no possible way of helping someone starving across oceans. [EDIT: 0]

Water and electricity usage, on the other hand, could have more immediate impact on the globe. Fresh water is scarce in many regions, including in the US. Fresh water production and distribution isn't free and has an impact on the environment (see the California aqueduct project and its impact on locations it redirected water from). Electricity isn't free, it requires the consumption of fuels (presently). Consequently a demand on those resources: 1) drives up their costs; 2) necessitates more mining and/or drilling. It's impossible to argue that those actions have no environmental impact.

What's the consequence of this on someone in Peru? Potentially more jobs if they have resources people want. So that's good. Potentially more harm to their environment. Potentially more difficulty in accessing fuels needed for energy production if costs are driven too high (with present market value of oil, a non-issue). (I suppose I should research the Peruvian economy to know what the particular impact might be).

Now, is my 20 minute shower this morning trying to wake up and loosen up some extremely sore muscles going to have any impact? Probably not. Over the course of the year? Potentially. Even ignoring the potential impact of a nation of twenty-minute daily showerers, there's just the personal impact of reduced spending power due to increased spending on water and electricity (water is "free" for me, so my electric bill is my concern).

These are just the things that pop to mind, they can probably all be refuted or decent counterarguments presented for why they're less of a concern compared to X, Y, or Z.

0: That is, telling kids they should finish their vegetables because of starving kids in China was silly/stupid/moronic. By that stage, the vegetables' consumption at the table has no impact on anyone else on the planet. They'll be eaten, or be discarded. The point of impact was in determining where to ship them and where to produce them in the first place. Since production in location X has no impact on production in location Y (for the most part, see my reference to the California aqueduct for a counterexample), the determination of where to sell the produced vegetables is what matters if you want to have a global impact.

> That is, telling kids they should finish their vegetables because of starving kids in China was silly/stupid/moronic.

No it's not. It's about teaching kids awareness. Of not taking things for granted. Of appreciating their privilege.

The stereotype of Millennials being narcissistic and spoiled has a lot of truth.

Was going to comment about the same thing. I think a cool feature of a smart shower might actually be a timer that lets you know if you're going overboard.

Why not put a piece of translucent contact paper on the outside of one of the shower walls and project onto that?

Man, all I can think of now is how to build an augmented reality I/O system. Qwerty bathroom tiles?

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