My parents currently run a showroom selling furniture, next too my house. We have a very old photo album with hundreds of photo's of previous jobs we have undertaken. These photo's are deteriorating with age but we have ALL of them saved on my computers on my network. What they want me too do is turn an old laptop into a digital photo frame. From what i have read from previous mods they are very simple to make. I just have several questions about what i need for this mod. 1: System Requirements- I am planning on buying one of These laptops so massacre. All of them have missing bits and bobs witch brings me too my next question 2:Linux- Instead of having to buy a copy of any windows OS would i be able to run Linux off a disk, and have the photos load off another computer on the network. Bearing in mind that all the other PC's on the network are windows. 3: Control- I would also like to be able to have the customers be able to pause, skip, and search (search isnt essential) for a photo they would like too see. This would mean i have to tag the images or something like that. The frame isn't going to be wall mounted so it will be set on a desk to wireless isn't nesccisary. Just means i have to run a 40m network cable outside my house witch doesn't bother me Talking of witch are network cables waterproof? Any feedback will be appreciated. Also examples of using Linux on a photo frame would
It would be easy to make a webpage to cycle through the pics. There are many slideshow options, in various languages. That would allow you to use any basic computer cabable of a network connection and running a browser.
well how were you planning on input from the viewers then on your machine if not through a mouse?? you could write a java app similar to a game where you configure special short cuts you could make it like walking through a gallery with WASD being directional keys and pressing space in front of a picture zooms in/out
For viewer control, Griffin do a cool USB controller which looks like a volume control knob, but is programmable so you could use it to scroll through a multimedia slide show.. http://www.griffintechnology.com/products/powermate/ Or forget about a computer solution & go for a memory card reader with a TV output. Like this one:- http://www.sandisk.com/Products/ProductInfo.aspx?ID=1153. Comes with a remote control & a usb port for an external disk. Plug it into any old TV screen...
Keep the laptop keyboard and mouse on the back of the frame to make it controllable still. Also, set up a VPN client like Logmein or equivlant, that way you can remote access the frame for whatever reason.
