Ease of use, UX, kits, open fleets, and more!

[chrisys]

I've had a few people contact me wondering if there are kits available, as well as people giving these as gifts to non-technical friends/family members for novelty and practical reasons.

I have been thinking of ways how to make this easier for people. Some things to investigate:

• 1. Consider adding WiFi Connect to the project to allow dynamic setup of the device's WiFi connection when it's shipped to a new location.
• 2. Implement a basic web interface to allow the settings to be changed without requiring a balena login
• 3. Use an open fleet on balenaHub to simplify the process of deployment (requires 2. to be in place)
• 4. Update 3D printed case to be easier to print and assemble - use positive fixings (i.e. screws) for screen and Pi, remove the need to print with so many supports and ease tolerances on screen fitting.
• 5. Make kits of parts available - e.g. everything required except the Pi, including a pre-flashed SD card.
• 6. Consider a solder-free assembly path, perhaps some kind of adapter PCB with pogo pins

These are a bunch of ideas I've been thinking about to address the various pain points I've seen people encounter over the past couple of years. I'd like to continue developing the project and allow more people to build these displays, so if anyone has any input or if anything particular in the above list sounds good, let me know!

[jimmykl]

Not sure if this is active any more but a vote for 1 ✋

I'm going to send one to some friends overseas and even with their wifi password it'd be much neater if they could set it up themselves (especially if they move, change router or network name in the future…)