MakerSam (u/MakerSam)

MakerSam commented on Bumble Berry Pi – A Cheap DIY Raspberry Pi Handheld Cyberdeck github.com/samcervantes/b... · Posted by u/MakerSam

pkphilip · a month ago

What is the possibility of attaching a GSM module to this to make voice calls and send SMS? I mean, can we make this into a basic phone?

MakerSam · a month ago

You might be able to do it with a cellular modem hat like this one: https://a.co/d/2zFdzec

You might need to design a new back panel for the enclosure.

MakerSam commented on Bumble Berry Pi – A Cheap DIY Raspberry Pi Handheld Cyberdeck github.com/samcervantes/b... · Posted by u/MakerSam

anonymousiam · 2 months ago

Yes, the Bumble Berry Pi is a lot cheaper than the Hackberry Pi, but the Hackberry Pi (with a CM5) performs much better.

I don't have a 3D printer, so I bought the kit from Elecrow. I had to buy my own CM5, a 2TB NVMEe SSD, and a suitably sized WiFi antenna (that would fit into the case without modification). I also picked up a $60 portable (1k) HDMI monitor because the 720x720 screen is difficult to use for apps like Firefox and Thunderbird. I use an Apple wireless keyboard and an Acer wireless mouse (both Bluetooth). The keyboard & monitor fit nicely into a plastic A4 document jacket. I was surprised that the Hackberry's USB-A ports provide enough juice to power the monitor. The Hackberry Pi has got a big battery. The one Hackberry Pi design choice that I don't like is the lack of an RJ45 Ethernet port. They could have left off the I2C port and squeezed a PHY in there somehow. (The CM5 has an Ethernet controller.) I've noticed that if I use a USB-A Ethernet dongle, it sometimes hangs under heavy traffic. I've tried dongles with different chipsets and they all seem to have the same issue. The WiFi speeds (as long as you have a good antenna) are great, and are usually faster than a USB Ethernet dongle anyway.

The thing is ideal for travel. It can fit into any hotel room safe, or go with you.

MakerSam · 2 months ago

Very cool - amazing that you can fit something that small in your pocket and it can also power a full size monitor & keyboard. It sounds like the Hackberry Pi is a great fit for your use case. I hadn’t considered using the Bumble Berry like that, but now that you mention it, I might try it out like that next time I travel.

It would be nice to have the beefier Pi 5 on Bumble Berry for the rare times that I need a GUI. I mostly use terminal on this device so it’s usually not a problem, but when I do have to use the full GUI I find the 3b+ annoyingly slow.

I briefly tested the Bumble Berry battery with a Pi 500 and although I got an error message saying that the power supply is not capable of supplying 5A, it seemed to run just fine. The battery is rated to 3A, and streaming full screen video on a 4K screen seemed to draw only about 1A (measured by a usb-c pass-thru dongle). However, I did not push the Pi 5 to its limits and I haven’t used it for an extended amount of time so I can’t confidently say how well it would work.

If you’re willing to pay the extra cash and want a smaller form factor it sounds like Hackberry is definitely the way to go.

MakerSam commented on Bumble Berry Pi – A Cheap DIY Raspberry Pi Handheld Cyberdeck github.com/samcervantes/b... · Posted by u/MakerSam

DroneBetter · 2 months ago

is Raspberry Pi OS entirely usable without a trackpad/mouse or does this need an external one to be connected?

MakerSam · 2 months ago

The Bumble Berry has a touchscreen, so if you need to use the Raspberry PI OS GUI, you can simple use your finger as a mouse pointer. I've found it works pretty well for the rare occasions that I need to start the GUI.

However, I mostly use this unit in terminal, which means I boot to terminal and only occasionally start up the GUI with startx when I need it.

I use terminal because: I'm trying to brush up on my terminal skills and most of my use-cases are covered in terminal with applications. Some of my favorite terminal applications are:

tmux - for managing multiple terminal windows nano - for writing code (occasionally I use vim) tty-clock - nice clock screen saver lynx - text based web browser. works surprisingly well on some sites like wikipedia epy - ebook reader - great for reading classic free ebooks from Project Gutenberg doom - because doom cmatrix - matrix-style screensaver - looks really cool

My main use case is for learning new code languages - it's nice to have a handheld device on me to practice writing code when I have a few minutes on me but don't have a laptop

MakerSam commented on Bumble Berry Pi – A Cheap DIY Raspberry Pi Handheld Cyberdeck github.com/samcervantes/b... · Posted by u/MakerSam

anonymousiam · 2 months ago

It looks similar to this project: https://github.com/ZitaoTech/HackberryPiCM5

I picked one up a few months ago and I like it.

MakerSam · 2 months ago

Nice. Did you build your Hackberry or buy it?

The Hackberry looks awesome. I was going to build/buy one, but I wanted a slightly bigger screen and keyboard, and I also wanted to save some money by using an old 3b+ I had laying around. And I wanted to be able to build it quickly from off-the-shelf Amazon components. So all-in I think I spent ~$70 on this one, whereas the hackberry pi would have cost about double that, and then I would have had to buy the CM5 module.

Curious to hear of your experience with the hackberry - I still might consider getting one of those myself.

MakerSam commented on Bumble Berry Pi – A Cheap DIY Raspberry Pi Handheld Cyberdeck github.com/samcervantes/b... · Posted by u/MakerSam

poisonborz · 2 months ago

> I wanted something small enough to fit into a pants pocket

I always wanted to know what kind of pants people wear who say that to this device size (see also Nintendo DS & co)

MakerSam · 2 months ago

I wear size 36 Levi's and this one fits in my back pocket

MakerSam commented on Ask HN: Who is hiring? (July 2025) · Posted by u/whoishiring

MakerSam · 6 months ago

Blue Origin | Full Stack Web Software Engineer | ONSITE in Seattle, WA or Huntsville, AL | Full Time | https://www.blueorigin.com

Come build the road the space with us!

You'll be a part of a great team. We have a fun & positive vibe, along with great Principal & Senior Engineers to serve as mentors. This leads to a our team having a solid track record of delivering results for our customers.

Here's what you'll do:

- Build full stack web React web applications with Next.js

- Build data pipelines in Typescript

- Deploy code on Kubernetes with Terraform

- Work directly with customers to gather requirements, build features, get lots of great feedback, and continually iterate to build even better software features

- Work with brilliant rocket engineers

- Create software tools to track manufacturing & cost

- Implement graph data structures & algorithms for manufacturing process directed graphs

- Be a part of a long term mission of millions of people living and working in space

Learn more & apply here!

Software Engineer II: https://blueorigin.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/BlueOrigin/job/Seat...

Software Engineer III: https://blueorigin.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/BlueOrigin/job/Seat...

MakerSam commented on Eighty Years of the Finite Element Method (2022) link.springer.com/article... · Posted by u/sandwichsphinx

angry_moose · a year ago

I've been a full-time FEM Analyst for 15 years now. It's generally a nice article, though in my opinion paints a far rosier picture of the last couple decades than is warranted.

Actual, practical use of FEM has been stagnate for quite some time. There have been some nice stability improvements to the numerical algorithms that make highly nonlinear problems a little easier; solvers are more optimized; and hardware is of course dramatically more capable (flash storage has been a godsend).

Basically every advanced/"next generation" thing the article touts has fallen flat on its face when applied to real problems. They have some nice results on the world's simplest "laboratory" problem, but accuracy is abysmal on most real-world problems - e.g. it might give good results on a cylinder in simple tension, but fails horribly when adding bending.

There's still nothing better, but looking back I'm pretty surprised I'm still basically doing things the same way I was as an Engineer 1; and not for lack of trying. I've been on countless development projects that seem promising but just won't validate in the real world.

Industry focus has been far more on Verification and Validation (ASME V&V 10/20/40) which has done a lot to point out the various pitfalls and limitations. Academic research and the software vendors haven't been particularly keen to revisit the supposedly "solved" problems we're finding.

MakerSam · a year ago

stagnate last 15 years??? Contact elements, bolt preload, modeling individual composite fibers, delamination progressive ply failure, modeling layers of material to a few thousandths of an inch. Design optimization. ANSYS Workbench = FEA For Dummies. The list goes on.

MakerSam commented on Ask HN: Who is hiring? (February 2023) · Posted by u/whoishiring

MakerSam · 3 years ago

Blue Origin | Senior Web Software Engineer | Onsite: Seattle, WA / Los Angeles, CA / Huntsville, AL

My team is hiring a Senior Software Engineer to build software tools to empower our hardware engineers to build better rockets. Our company's vision is to have millions of people living & working in space for the benefit of earth. Our team has really smart people, tackles hard problems, has a track record of delivering results, and is a fun place to be.

We're looking for a full-stack web developer to take ownership over the whole application life cycle, so we're looking experience in the following:

Front-end: React, D3

Back-end: FastAPI, Flask, Node/Express, GraphQL, Redshift POSTGRESQL

Devops: Gitlab CI/CD, Kubernetes / Moon Rancher

Algorithms: Graph algorithms

Full-Stack: We recently started using Next.js/Blitz to achieve a more rails-flavored developer experience and we love it. So it's great if you have experience with these also, or at least an eagerness to learn.

Manufacturing: Experience working in a manufacturing environment, and/or implementing Lean, Six-Sigma, & Toyota Production System principles is a plus.

Sound interesting? Apply here: https://www.linkedin.com/jobs/view/senior-software-developme...

MakerSam commented on Don't make me think, or why I switched to Rails from JavaScript SPAs reviewbunny.app/blog/dont... · Posted by u/vdemedes

andrei_says_ · 4 years ago

What are some specific “magical things” that are not mentioned in the rails guides?

There’s always room for improvement and the documentation is an important part of the framework.

MakerSam · 4 years ago

I don't think the Rails Guides mention Devise, the authentication gem, which is pretty important if you want create a public facing website with users. The devise documentation is pretty good though. Again, a little bit of a learning curve, but once you learn it you can add user authentication to your site pretty quickly.

https://github.com/heartcombo/devise#getting-started