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Build Your Own LCD Bus Schedule

Posted by michael on from the mass-transit dept.

MikeLRoy writes "An engineering student in Winnipeg, tired of missing his bus to school (and waiting in the cold) created an LCD bus stop. It displays the next bus times for several stops and routes, all from the heated comfort of his kitchen. And yes, there are pics and code on the site."

27 of 402 comments (clear)

  1. what?? by xao+gypsie · · Score: 5, Funny

    why, back in my day, we didnt have all these new fangled computer bus scheduler thingies. we had to work out the algorithm in our heads in the snow uphill going both ways....kids these days......

    xao

    --


    xao
    http://TheHillforum.hopto.org
    1. Re:what?? by JanusFury · · Score: 4, Funny

      And the buses didn't have these newfangled 'stops', either! You had to chase them down on foot, jump onto the back, and climb in through the emergency escape hatch on top!

      --
      using namespace slashdot;
      troll::post();
    2. Re:what?? by angst_ridden_hipster · · Score: 5, Funny

      Emergency hatches? Why you lucky bastards! Where I grew up, the busses were sealed. If we wanted a ride, we'd have to chase after them, and grab on to a bit of barbed wire tied to the rear bumper, and hold on for dear life as we got dragged to our destination.

      Emergency hatches? Feh! No wonder the youth of today are so soft. Why, you probably had all your own limbs all the way up to adulthood! Emergency hatches...

      --
      Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachtani?
      www.fogbound.net
    3. Re:what?? by damien_kane · · Score: 5, Funny

      we had to work out the algorithm in our heads in the snow uphill going both ways...

      I remember the times my dad used to tell me this story all the time...
      Now I just say 'Shut up, Dad; or I'm putting you in a home'...

    4. Re:what?? by Aquitaine · · Score: 4, Funny

      Rear bumber? Why, sonny, you don't know how good you had it! Where I grew up, they certainly didn't have those bumber gadgets. You lept in front of that oncoming bus and prayed to high heaven that it was going fast enough to take you where you wanted to go before you slid off the grill.

      You probably had all your own ribs all the way up to adulthood! Rear bumbers...

  2. Great idea... by Cutriss · · Score: 4, Funny

    I hope he doesn't have class tonight, or else his clock is going to be running a bit slow, thanks to the Slashdotting... :)

    --
    "Mod, mod, mod...and another troll bites the dust."
  3. Hrm. by d3kk · · Score: 5, Funny

    What I'd like to know is why an engineering student is still worried about missing a bus to school..

  4. incorrect perl script link on his site by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    should be:

    http://members.shaw.ca/rosensto/bus/bus.pl

  5. Eeek. Look at the klenex box. by rainer_d · · Score: 4, Funny

    I'm sure he needs more time to look at pr0n, so that's why he actually built the LCD.

    --
    Windows 2000 - from the guys who brought us edlin
  6. This idiot didn't realize there is a bus schedule? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    What happened to either 1) looking the routes online, or 2) grabbing the routes from the library? Was this guy just going out to bus stops at random, hoping he got there at the right time? What was so hard about viewing the paper schedule?

    And how is he gonna use this thing he made when he's AWAY from home? Come home?

  7. Interesting idea by mikeage · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I have to say... this is one of the more clever "Remote Screen" hacks I've seen. Unlike digitized foosball tables or automatic drink mixing machine, it doesn't require any large investments in hardware, just a simple text LCD. And it actually looks kinda useful. Unfortunetly, NJTransit only makes schedules available in PDF, but... it's a cute idea.

    On another note, my school (Rutgers) has a site called www.whereismybus.com (appears to be down at the moment), which uses a java applet to track buses in real-time. Only problem-- none of the bus terminals are within range of access points, and it takes a year to load (major java-bloat, methinks), but an interesting idea nonetheless.

    --
    -- Is "Sig" copyrighted by www.sig.com?
  8. Sing a happy tune.... by Ab0rtRetryFail · · Score: 4, Funny

    [Singing loudly]
    EVERY MORNING I WOULD SEE HER WAITING AT THE STOP!

    Sometimes she'd shop and she would show me what she bought!
    [/Singing loudly]

    AHEM. Sorry... got carried away there. :)

  9. Re:Buses? by smithmc · · Score: 5, Insightful


    Waddaya mean, "be a grad student my hole life"? He's an undergraduate freshman. And if you want to skip school and jump into the job market as a tester, that's all fine and good, but if you did it for the money (as your post indicates) it wasn't such a good move. Ten years from now, this guy's probably going to be making at least twice your salary.

    --
    Downmodding is the refuge of the weak. Don't downmod, make a better argument!
  10. Re:Buses? by IanBevan · · Score: 4, Funny

    Sorry but i'd rather stay on my own software testing track and have enough $ to buy my own car.
    Sure i work for MSFT but at least i can afford to drive a car, take girls out to eat, and go to the casinoes.
    Don't mean to be discrimenatorie but it's just how i feel. I'd rather spend time working towards a nice professional job that my kid will look up to than being a grad student (TA) my hole life.

    Uh-huh. I can see it now...
    "Geeez dad, please don't wear that Microsoft shirt when you pick me up from school. And I think I'll find somebody literate to help with my spelling...."

    --
    Never, ever lose a file again. Ever.
  11. Amazingly by rcs1000 · · Score: 5, Informative

    In England we have a lot of this technology already.

    (Amazingly, too, English people seem convinced their country is heading backwards at full speed towards the ice age, but that's another story.)

    In central London all the bus stops contain LED displays showihng how long you'll have to wait for each bus. Likewise, on the tube (underground, subway) their are simialr displays. Normally they say things like "Baker Street 3minutes; Chancery Lane you'll be lucky" but hey...

    There are companies like Kizoom (sp?) that offer these same services over WAP so you can make sure that when you leave your home/office then you *will* make your bus, metro, etc.

    --
    --- My dad's political betting
    1. Re:Amazingly by FrostedWheat · · Score: 5, Funny

      I was traveling south a few months ago, and in Luton I saw this.

      Had to take a picture :)

      Image quality is rubbish, cheap camera.

  12. how it works in London by fiddlesticks · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Less homebrewed than this cool hack, London Transport (LRT) has been operating a system of displaying (estimated) wait times for certian routes for a good few years

    Some observations:
    1. When I lived above a London bus stop, I could lean out the window and see when the next bus was due :)
    2. This was great, but *useless* if it relied on scheduled times
    3. LRT soon installed receiver/ transmitters into its buses, reporting a far more accurate ETA, as they could report bad delays in real(ish) time
    4. sometimes I noticed humans on the end of the LCDs - eg once it reported 'awful traffic...no idea of arrival' :)


    5. Plans are afoot for the following: audio repeater, large Countdown signs at bus stations, hand-held Countdown terminals for operations staff and a central real-time travel information desk

      Loads of info

      Nice image - Nice image

      blurb
    --
    http://milkshake.dexy.org
  13. Re:with the money and time by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    that he put into the LCD and everything else in the project, he could have worked and bought a car. Sure, there's the geeky challenge of it all, but just as you don't win friends with salad, you don't get chicks by riding the bus.

    quite, possibly, like my self, he has a car but chooses to take the bus becasue:

    • buses are more environmently friendly
    • buses don't need to park
    • buses cost less to ride
    • ect

    sure i don't get chicks while riding the bus, but who wants a chick that is that shallow?

    remember, one person can't fix the world alone, but one can ruin it for all

  14. Why he needs it.. by hopbine · · Score: 4, Informative

    A lot of replies are why does he need this not a written bus schedule. Well snow and winter tend to disrupt thing up here. The bus does not always run to the exact minute that they obviously do in New York Or London. At times in Ottawa (and Winnipeg) they may be as much as 5 minutes late. With the weather we have that's a hell of long time

    --
    Semper ubi sub ubi
  15. Re:I wish I had thought of that... by shird · · Score: 4, Informative

    I'm assuming the schedules are automatically updated based on how far behind or ahead on schedule the buses are. In aus at least, the buses have little transmitters or whatever which are picked up by recievers in the road, and the LED displays at major bus stops are updated with this information. I'm guessing the web page he is pulling this info from is also updated dynamically like this.

    --
    I.O.U One Sig.
  16. Wouldn't It Have Been Cheaper... by reallocate · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...to tape the bus schedule to the refrigerator door?

    I'd be more impressed if he built a robot that poked him with a sharp stick 5 minutes before the bus got there.

    --
    -- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
  17. Re:Why a bus? Why not a bicycle? by Billly+Gates · · Score: 4, Informative
    DO you have any idea how cold Winterpeg oops I mean Winnipeg is during the Winter?

    Or have you ever tried to ride a bike on a snow covered road? Enough said.

    ..for the ignorant Americans who are unfamiliar with geography, Winnipeg is just north of Minesota, near North dakota and its even farther north then Montana.

    They literally have artic winters that rival polar cities in the northern hemisphere due to their geography. The reason why the prairies of Canada are so cold is because its flat all the way to the north pole. There is nothing to stop artic air from sliding down south during the winter. The temperatures in Winnipeg are literally colder then Ankerage Alaska and vary only a few degree's of extreme northern canada. No shit. At least in the northeast and northwest there are mountains and ocean influences but not in that part of Canada.

    How the early settlers survived? I have no idea. But its so cold that car owners remove their batteries out of their cars at night since they will be dead by morning.

    Would you want to ride a bike in this? I think not.

    --
    http://saveie6.com/
  18. Re:I wish I had thought of that... by mrseigen · · Score: 5, Funny

    Considering that here in Alberta we don't have that, I don't think it's very likely that any non-Ontario provinces will have it either. I get my bus schedules from taking out my cell phone and calling the number on the bus stop sign, which then tells me that there are x minutes remaining until a bitter public servant crashes his bus into the shelter I'm cowering behind.

    Neat idea though.

  19. Re:I am not an electrician! by wkitchen · · Score: 4, Informative
    Voltage doesn't matter, it's amperage that'll kill you...
    That is a popular, but very dangerous idea. It is the current that can kill you, but voltage definitely does matter. How much current flows depends on both voltage and resistance. Human bodies exhibit widely varying, but usually relatively high resistance. A 12 volt car battery is capable of delivering 10 to 50 times more current than a 110V wall outlet. But you are far more likely to harmed by touching the terminals of the wall outlet than the terminals of the car battery. Unlike the 110V at the outlet, 12V usually isn't enough to cause a dangerous current to flow accross the high resistance of a human body. That the battery is capable of delivering enormous current doesn't change that. But don't let that lull you into a false sense of security either. Low voltages can sometimes cause a shock, it just requires more unusual circumstances and is much less likely to cause serious harm. Of course, electrical shock isn't the only possible hazard. Sparks igniting flammable materials, for example. Or being burned by a piece of wire that is hot because of a short. Low voltages can easily create those hazards, especially if lots of current is available

    Unless you are absolutely certain that a power source is inherently capable of delivering only very small current (like your taser example, though that is not completely without danger either), "higher voltage = greater danger" is an entirely reasonable assumption.
  20. From the release notes by nakaduct · · Score: 4, Funny

    To-Do:
    [next release] show when the next bus leaves for "way the fuck out of Winnipeg"

  21. Bussing in Winnipeg by freeweed · · Score: 4, Informative

    For everyone out there saying this guy should take a bike, it's no big deal waiting for a bus, etc...

    Let me just tell you what it's like up here in Winnipeg.

    Tonight, for example, it's going down to -35C. That's damn near -35F for you yank types (ie: DAMN COLD). Cycling to work here is almost impossible, because in addition to the cold we have almost no bicycle lanes, and driving on the road is a joke - ice and snow cover the roads for 4-6 months a year.

    In short, busses are absolutely essential, and seeing as how our schedules change every couple of months, staying on top of it is one big pain. Kudos to this guy for coming up with something clever!

    --
    Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
  22. A nice toy with little utility ... by lushman · · Score: 4, Interesting

    At the end of the day, it is a real waste of time for the computer to be looking up timetables which is really where your problem originates - missing the bus is not just about being at the stop at the scheduled time. In my experience, buses can be anywhere from 5-10 minutes early or late, with little way of predicting either way.

    What would be useful is real-time tracking of buses and their respective positions ... simply by using existing wireless data networks. Here in Sydney, Australia, all major bus routes have almost perfect access to three GSM/GPRS networks, with Vodafone at least offering a locating system on top ....

    Now if you could access all this information via WAP/GPRS on your cell phone, you would have an inexpensive and accurate way to know whether there actually is time for another beer without missing the bus. It could also mean that you would waste less time sitting around at a bus stop with your fingers crossed.

    I'm sorry if this is a bit off-topic but maybe we shouldn't cry revolution every time someone homebrews an LCD with Linux to display something.