Ask HN: What strategies and tools to hide reading and writing in plain sight?

[poroshenky]

From time to time it happens to me that I'm in public and I catch someone peeking at my laptop while I'm reading or writing, and, especially at libraries, even outright negative comments on what I'm doing. It doesn't help that the culture in my countries encourage this behaviour.

I've been thinking about gathering as much strategies and tools I can to counteract this that would benefit me and, I know you are there, other people with the same concern. What I've come up for now is:

* Screen privacy film. Great, but people would come in my visual field and see everything anyway.

* Fonts designed for (supposed) better remembering like Open Dyslexic or Sans Forgetica. It's hard to read but I'm not sure people wouldn't guess what's written anyway.

* Alternative writing system. I don't know how much it's worth but it would deter casual passersby and compulsive peekers.

* Lower brightness. Did it for some time but it gives me nausea if ambient brightness doesn't at least match brightness on the screen.

What else could there be?

[jotux]

If you have the correct type of display you can remove the polarizing film and put it in glasses so only you can read the screen: https://www.instructables.com/Privacy-monitor-made-from-an-o...

[RGamma]

What are you doing exactly that prompts these reactions?

[HomeDeLaPot]

There's always Alt+Tab. Keep an innocent-looking window open in the background and use keyboard shortcuts to instantly switch to it when someone approaches.

Keep your reading/writing window itself small, with a small font.

Read and write in the terminal, since the UI is unfamiliar to people. Or disguise your reading/writing material as another application such as Microsoft Word, Outlook, or maybe even an IDE. (Thinking of sites/apps like MSWorddit, this particular one might not work anymore though: https://github.com/pcottle/MSWorddit)

If you're up for it, you could learn a new language and do your reading and writing in that language. Ideally choose a language that you have studied before or want to learn, and that's close enough to your own languages to get started quickly, but different enough so as not to be commonly understood in your area or have too many recognizable words (cognates).

Hopefully a combination of those and the other approaches people have suggested will work for you.

[entrepy123]

1- VR headset (Quest, etc.)

2- Two folders. This is an old one that used to be used when taking exams IIRC. Open them up at 90 degrees and stand them on their side. This forms a three-sided "box" with an open top, a back wall, and a wall on either side of your notebook/paper/tablet. Put your work pretty flat on the table. This is like a little portable cubicle. Your work gets privacy unless someone is literally hovering right where your head is, in which case you dismiss them because that is rude.

3- There are literal "laptop tent/hood" products of various designs that are made to keep the machine/screen out of the sun, so you can work outside. But this sounds like the best fit for your use case too, IMO. In the past I've seen sleek black designs, though some look like a tent for the beach or camping based on a quick search now.

But yeah standard answer is 3M privacy shield with very limited range of vision and dim your screen.

[cookiengineer]

If you have a pre-OLED display which has an LCD inside it, you can remove the polarization foils on top of the screen itself.

Make a pair of glasses out of the layers of those polarization foils and then only you can see what's on the screen and everyone else is just seeing a white bright light.

There's even instructables tutorials about this [1] so you can do this too :)

I'd recommend to try it out on non-laptop screen first if you do this the first time, however.

[1] https://www.instructables.com/Privacy-monitor-made-from-an-o...

[theGeatZhopa]

Apple's VisionPro or any other suitable VR headset.

Have you ever heard of mirror glasses? Its turning everything upside down. So, if you use a glasses like that, you can turn your screen upside down (press ALT and one of the arrows on Windows g Intel graphic drivers) and see it properly, straight. But the peekers will see everything upside down:)

What other ways? Blind typing with a Bluetooth keyboard, screen film, may be some polarizing film and a polarizing glasses will do it, too - never tried it, though.

[chewxy]

I use a ~Nreal~ Xreal Air as my secondary monitor. When I don't want people to look, I simply lower the brightness of my primary laptop monitor to be a black screen.

[NBJack → chewxy]

Have enjoyed use of original Air glasses as well. It is pleasantly versatile, and great if you ever need to read mildly sensitive data in a public setting (or even airplane).

Bonus points if you have a Samsung Dex capable phone; with a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse, you can enjoy a fairly robust Android desktop environment (and live the cyberpunk dream).

[themadturk]

A variation on your font idea -- how about using a very small font? Assuming you're a decent touch typist, you should only need to look at the screen occasionally (or you're OK with going back and editing later). Perhaps make the font just large enough for you to see at your normal viewing distance, but difficult to make out when further away. Or choose a low contrast font color to make the font difficult to read at a distance.

[landosaari]

Find a place where your back is against a wall.

Libraries tend to have a place for seclusion; where you can have an interview or small group meeting.

These may need to be reserved. Speak with the librarian, services provided are higher than one perceives.

Using polarised glasses and modification to a monitor [0]

[0] https://yt.artemislena.eu/watch?v=zL_HAmWQTgA

[layer8]

You know how you can read hidden messages with colored glasses? [0] Maybe you can use some variation of that. Though you might still get negative comments.

Otherwise, learn to write ROT13 or something.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DfRZBkYGlfk

[verdverm]

I'm using https://immersed.com with a quest 3 until the visor arrives, for a virtual desktop (multiple virtual monitors), but your privacy use case fits the bill

[h2odragon]

(a) learn to say "mind yer bidness" and ignore incivility as far as possible from those who will not

(b) keep a factorio or worldbox game up in the background and switch to that when people get peeking and shoulder surfing. Alternately some really rancid porn or gore video or something similarly likely to repel; but that can have unfortunate follow ons too.

(c) retreat from public life. wander off into the woods, build a cabin, live a monk-ish existence of pure contemplation