mika
E-ink display - Inky library shout out & showcase
I wanted to thank the maintainers and contributors of the Inky library!
It allowed me to create this small prototype in no time:
Made with a Raspi Zero + InkyPhat display, using Nerves and Scenic.
A bit of context: I work at Instinct. We develop a software that allows veterinary hospital teams to track inpatient treatment efficiently - something that is often done on paper or antiquated software… This helps with patient safety, staff stress level, charge capture, and more. It’s written in Elixir of course 
I noticed that the data we already import and update could be used for a fun project: cage cards. Animals at these hospitals reside in a cage between tests and treatments and yet another piece of paper is used to identify the patient (the cage card). It’s important for this card info to be accurate. This small prototype connects to Instinct’s API (running Absinthe), fetches data for the cage it’s assigned to and displays it.
I’m already thinking about making another prototype using the larger Inky display, and maybe later a touchscreen LCD.
BTW: we’re hiring!
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First 7 of 7 Posts
AstonJ
That’s fantastic! I love seeing Elixir being used in the animal world
please keep us updated 
outlog
just spotted inky as well.. great use case @mika ! have ordered an eink display accordingly..
major shout out to the co-author @lawik - great blog posts at Underjord | Blog and recently on hacker news: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20357055
nyaray
Happy to see code being put into putting patient security furrst!
lawik
Ooh! Very happy to see this being used. Bonus for adorable and positive purposes.
Let us know if you encounter any issues
lawik
Hope you enjoy the display! Thanks for the shoutout and glad you enjoy the assorted writings
tristan
Woo! My wife is a veterinarian, cool to hear there is some BEAM being used in the industry
And that beam is being used for some good!
lawik
Just did a write-up on the library and how to get started, in case anyone wants to dive in to do what mika has done: Underjord | An eInk display with Nerves & Elixir - Getting started with Inky
A tip that I just verified now. I think I found it on the product page but it had slipped me by previously. If you initialize the display as if it is black/white (even if it has color) it will be faster. It won’t have the accent color obviously. But from a guesstimate I’d say several seconds shaved off of the refresh time.