Hacker News Reader

Same on all counts, though I went a step further and wired in a microminiature slide switch to completely power off the camera. That way applications see "no camera" unless I go out of my way to power it on. I painted the "on" side of the switch in retroreflective paint so I can see when it's on at a glance too, whether the camera is in use or not. This was on a thinkpad though, I doubt macos would tolerate a disappearing camera.

View on HN

It totally does, internally the camera is just connected over USB. (I can tell you it copes with a disappearing camera because mine disappeared a while ago and never came back)

Do you have pictures to share? Sounds cool.

Sadly no pictures of the insides. I'll give you a description though. I cut a trace on the camera module (should have cut the cable instead on second thought) and soldered in two bits of enamel wire that go to a slide switch. Clipped a little bit of plastic off the lid so the switch was accessible, blind-drilled two tiny holes in the lid for the alignment pegs of the switch to go into, and glued it in place. I then did the painting with a very fine brush under a microscope. The wires are routed around the camera module and the switch is to the left of the camera, in order not to interfere with the little LED on the right of the camera that illuminates the work area. The outside looks like this (I didn't bother cleaning up the cut-off plastic edge): https://imgur.com/a/UpB1dJn

Reply on news.ycombinator.com