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| | Ask HN: Cheap, hackable e-reader? | |
161 points by 0942v8653 on Mar 13, 2017 | hide | past | web | favorite | 57 comments |
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| I would like to buy a cheap e-reader where I can replace the software with my own (or at least be able to write my own software that I can launch and stay in, with minimal UI chrome around it). Preferably about $50 or under. I would like to have a touch screen or to be able to use most of the buttons. What are some good options for this? |
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I've been working on a linux distro for i.MX based e-paper readers (kindle, kobo, etc.) for a while and just had two other hackers join me on the project. Currently we are furthest along with the Kindle 4th generation non-touch with a slightly modified super minimal Debian booting and basic graphics support (Xorg works but no window manager and no screen auto-update yet. e-ink is weird). I believe we've managed to strip out all binary blobs so it's really all open source now. This system is still using an ancient kernel (a slight variation on the one used by the stock OS). We just got the latest stable kernel booting a few days ago but only barely (not even mmc support yet). There's just three of us for now, and we hang out in #fread.ink on freenode and our code is up on https://github.com/fread-ink
You should look at the repo https://github.com/fread-ink/fread-vagrant to get started.