DIY Skylight… again

[u/jlewsader]

I know there is a lot of discussion regarding building DIY version of the Skylight calendars… but I need some input and to toss around ideas.

My wife has been asking for a Skylight for at least a year now and I keep telling her I will try to DIY a solution instead of forking out the money for one 😁

It needs to be touchscreen so it’s easy for the whole family to use instead of just a display. But the real roadblocks are:
1) she would like it to be larger… like 27-32”!
2) We homeschool so she basically wants it to act as a digital whiteboard also. Thinking like second monitor or “cast” her iPad to it or something of the sorts.

Has anyone had any luck with those IR touch frames? That would definitely be a cheaper option than the $1k touchscreen monitors I am seeing at that size. Any other thoughts? I am not afraid of adb sideloading, “jailbreaks”, and any other tinking.

[u/Business_Annual_6673]

That IR touch frame rabbit hole goes deep, I've seen a few people on here make them work with a regular monitor and a raspberry pi. The calibration can be a pain but once its dialed in they're pretty responsive

For the whiteboard part you could probbaly just mirror her iPad screen over airplay using something like an app on the pi. Might have a tiny bit of lag but for a family calendar and scribbling notes it'd be fine

[u/blackax]

Honestly I just got a Dell 27 inch all in one ran wall mounted that. It runs linux and is mostly running firefox for the HA dashboard

[u/Sad-Back7911]

Old iPad route here: I built KinView for exactly this — an old iPad on the kitchen wall running a shared family calendar, plus chores with XP that my kids actually check. Free for 1 parent + 2 kids, no card; the $4.49/mo Plus tier adds voice-add and flyer-scan. Disclosure: I'm the maker, happy to answer setup questions. — Team Akizi