Post #3863493

So I bought a 25 inch e-ink colour digital signage display to play with. The product is EOL and has been replaced by a newer hardware generation, so one can now find this older device at somewhat bargain prices on eBay etc. It's a georgous piece of hardware, beautifully engineered and really nice to look at. But it's shocking to look closer at the firmware installed on it. The device is controlled by a bare bones Android OS and the pre-installed default application running on it is a piece of crap. Of course, the manufacturer Philips Professional Display Systems wants me to sign an NDA to get developer information. Luckily most of the required info can be found freely on the web. But it's amazing how the manufacturer makes enthusiasts' software development for their product unnecessarily difficult. I'm also pretty sure that an open source version of their default app would quickly result in a much better product package. NDAs for basic programming API documents are such a silly thing in 2026. /cc @Atc1441@mastodon.social