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A script to scrape useful things off the internet and display them on HD epaper

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Big Audrey: Quiet internet content on HD epaper.

Big Audrey pulls the stuff that you've told it you're intersted in from the internet, then displays it in pleasingly crispy fonts on a 6 inch HD epaper screen. The script currently can provide one, or any combination from a number different display functions at an interval you choose:

  • Cryptocurrency Dashboard
  • Quote (from Reddit r/quotes)
  • Word of the day (from wordsmith.org)
  • Headline (From an RSS feed) (With QR code link to the article)
  • Cartoon (From The New Yorker)
  • Quote (from Stoic Quotes)

Functions

Cryptocurrency Dashboard

Uses code based on the code we made at btcticker. The extra screen size means that two three or four coins can fit on the screen at once. If you've listed more coins than that, it will carousel to show all the coins listed. There is also a maximal mode that will show one coin and an item from and RSS news feed, and a QR code link to that article.

Quotes

This is a script that parses content from r/quotes and tidies it up a little to make an ever-changing Quote poster, using content from the hive-mind that is the internet.

The quote is then displayed on the attached Waveshare 6inch HD ePaper.

The reason for using r/quotes rather than a curated database, is that the karma score on reddit is a really good way to ensure quotes that are interesting and topical.

The quality of the results depends on the adherence to convention in posts to r/quotes and the quality of the regex in the script. Currently the script is rarely producing garbled quotes, so it's ready for sharing.

As well as producing quotes, the script occasionally places other content on the epaper - to keep things interesting.

Word of the day

A word and definition for you to try to shoehorn into conversations, making you look like a boffin.

Headline

A headline from an RSS feed from a news source specified in the config.yaml file.

Cartoon

A cartoon from The New Yorker RSS feed.

Daily Stoic Quote

A quote from stoic-quotes.com.

Prerequisites

  • A working Pi with waveshare 6inch HD ePaper attached
  • The code to drive the display: IT8951 installed

Installation

Get your RaspiOS up-to-date using

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade

then, enable the SPI interface and clone this repository using

cd ~
sudo raspi-config nonint do_spi 0
git clone https://github.com/veebch/stonks
sudo reboot

This will reboot the pi. Reconnect to the pi and install the modules needed to run this code, using pip and apt-get:

python3 -m pip install --upgrade pip  
python3 -m pip install -r requirements.txt
sudo apt-get install libatlas-base-dev python3-matplotlib python3-numpy

Make a copy of the example config file and run the code using:

cd ~/stonks
cp config_example.yaml config.yaml
python3 cryptotick.py

Configuration

Edit the file config.yaml. Entries are commented to indicate their function. There are boolean values for activation of modes, as well as a function section that lists the functions that are sampled from on each refresh iteration. There is also a weighting of those samples.

function:                           
  mode: crypto,redditquotes, wordaday, newyorkercartoon, guardianheadlines, textfilequotes, stoic
  weight: 1, 10, 1, 1, 1, 0, 1       

Means that on each iteration there is a 1:10:1:1:1:1 weighting that the code will choose the functions crypto, redditquotes, wordaday, newyorkercartoon, guardianheadlines and stoic respectively.

Add Autostart

cat <<EOF | sudo tee /etc/systemd/system/btcticker.service
[Unit]
Description=btcticker
After=network.target

[Service]
ExecStart=/usr/bin/python3 -u /home/pi/stonks/cryptotick.py
WorkingDirectory=/home/pi/stonks/
StandardOutput=inherit
StandardError=inherit
Restart=always
User=pi

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target
EOF

Now, simply enable the service you just made and reboot

sudo systemctl enable btcticker.service
sudo systemctl start btcticker.service

sudo reboot

Video

A demo of some of the features:

video

Hardware

  • The code runs on a Rasperry Pi connected to a 6 inch HD waveshare epaper display
  • The custom metal frame was made for the project - we've got some assembled units for sale at veeb.ch

Contributing

To contribute, please fork the repository and use a feature branch. Pull requests are welcome.

Licencing

GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE Version 3.0

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A script to scrape useful things off the internet and display them on HD epaper

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