Dirtnoodle

 

I have created a puzzle game called Dirtnoodle: https://byronknoll.com/dirtnoodle.html

It is inspired by a game called Snakebird.

Herbata

 

I just released a prototype game called Herbata: https://byronknoll.com/herbata.html

It is a fantasy RPG blending classic 'Choose Your Own Adventure' storytelling with tactical turn-based combat.

E-Paper Clock Kickstarter

I really like the e-paper clock that I built, so I decided to start a Kickstarter campaign to see if there is sufficient interest to build more. Here is the pre-launch page: click on the "Notify me on launch" button to follow along.

E-Paper Clock

Update (Nov 11, 2025): I am making this into a Kickstarter project! 

As a follow-up to my Kindle clock project, I have built an e-paper clock:

The display looks great and the time always keeps perfectly in sync via WiFi. It uses a Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W. I designed and 3D printed a case:

Link to case design.

Components + costs:

• Waveshare 7.5inch e-Paper Optical Bonding Display: $67.49
• e-Paper Driver HAT: $11.69
• Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W (pre-soldered header): $31.64
  
• Power supply + SD card: $21.69
• Shipping+fees: $19.19

Total cost: $151.7

The display does a fast "partial update" every minute (with some faint ghosting) and a full screen refresh every hour.

Kindle Clock

I decided to build my own digital clock. When searching for existing products online, it is surprising that I can't find any products that satisfy my basic checklist:

1. It should look nice: all I want to see is the time, which should be displayed in a nice font. >99% of current products use ugly segmented displays (blocky numbers with 90 degree angles).
2. It should be zero maintenance. The time should automatically sync and deal with daylight savings. Why should anyone have to manually set their clocks when Wi-Fi exists? >99% of products expect people to manually set the time!
3. It should have the correct brightness: not too bright when the room is dark and not too dim when the room is bright. >99% of products don't do this.

Bonus points if the clock has a backup battery and continues working when there is a power outage.

Recently I have been using the Nest Hub ($100) as a clock. It is almost the perfect clock (satisfying all three points on my checklist) except that it has a bug that randomly switches the display out of clock mode and back to the home screen about once a day. This bug is the reason I decided to build my own clock.

I built this using an old Kindle Paperwhite. The Kindle Paperwhite has an amazing e-ink display (perfect for bright rooms) and also has lighting so you can see it when it is dark.

I created a basic website to display the time and opened it in the Kindle web browser. Unfortunately the Kindle has a screen saver that automatically starts showing advertisements when you don't interact with it. In order to keep the time on the screen, I had to jailbreak the Kindle to disable the screen saver. Then I fit it into a picture frame and created a border around the time (so you can't see the browser panel). It can be hung up on a wall, although it will run out of battery when not plugged in. I prefer to keep it plugged in next to my desk.

Here is a comparison with the Nest Hub:

Update (9/29/2025): I found that displaying the clock through the Kindle browser is not reliable (an error message pops up about once a day). Using a Kindle app works much better. I forked a Kindle clock app and posted my changes to GitHub here. That also let me increase the font size to use up more of the display:

Crux Climber

My favorite sport is bouldering, so I decided to make a rock climbing game: https://byronknoll.com/crux-climber.html

Control the climber by dragging the hands or feet.

Robot Barber Update

 I posted an article here with more details about my robot hair cutting project.

Max Flow

 

I have released a new puzzle game on my website called Max Flow. The goal is to rearrange pipes to maximize water flow.

I tried out LLM assisted coding for this project using Visual Studio + GitHub Copilot + Claude Sonnet 4.

Activity Logger

I tried out "vibe coding" to create an activity logger for myself. I also released it on GitHub: https://github.com/byronknoll/EntityLog. I think it is pretty useful and plan to continue using it going forward.

MazeGPT

I created a game called MazeGPT: https://byronknoll.com/mazegpt.html

ChatGPT created the artwork. My seven year old daughter also helped make the game: coming up with level ideas, tracing the maze boundaries, and play testing.

Robot Barber

 I built a robot that can cut hair! Posted to YouTube.

Jabber Trail

I have just released a game called Jabber Trail, which you can play for free in a browser. All of the images, music, and character dialog in the game are AI generated. To make progress you have to chat with in game characters, which use a large language model to generate responses.

Cellular Automaton

 

Today I made a new cellular automaton. It can create similar patterns to an earlier cellular automaton I released here (a simulation of the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction). For the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction I used a pre-existing algorithm, but for this new cellular automaton I created the algorithm myself. I was trying to replicate some other interesting patterns I have seen:

• Magnetic domain (I saw an amazing exhibit about this at the San Francisco Exploratorium)
• Yogurt lid
• Repulsive curves

Bifurcation

 

I have made a two player strategy game called Bifurcation: link

How to play:

• The goal is to eliminate all of the other player's units.
• During your turn, you can move units from up to three locations. Click and drag to choose which locations to move. Use the slider on the right to select how many units to move.
• You can move to a neighboring location or any location connected by your team's color.
• At the start of your turn, you will gain units at any locations with a + symbol. The number of + symbols will be the number of units you gain.
• You can attack enemy units by moving to enemy territory. Opposing units will destroy each other, so you need to attack with more units than the enemy to take over a location.

Stacking Things

 

Today I released a HTML5 game called Stacking Things. It is a physics-based puzzle game. It uses planck.js for the physics and Phaser for the graphics/sound. The images came from a combination of public domain photos and images generated by Stable Diffusion.

Hexacrystal

I have designed and 3D printed my own board game. It is a two player strategy game called Hexacrystal. Each player controls one color. The game starts with two towers:

The rules are simple. Players take turns placing their pieces. Pieces can be placed anywhere on the board. The game ends when a player resigns, or no more pieces can be placed. The goal of the game is to create a connected path from your tower to the opponent's tower. Neighboring pieces of the same color form a path. The winner is the player whose path (connected to their own tower) gets closest to the opponent's tower. You simultaneously try to extend your path while blocking your opponent's path.

There are 2D and 3D versions of this game. In the 2D version, pieces occupy a single tile on the board. In the 3D version, the crystal pieces can extend beyond the edges of the tile so that they can block neighboring pieces. A valid move requires that the placed crystal doesn't touch any other pieces (verified with a "wiggle" test to make sure neighboring pieces don't move). This introduces more complex strategy: carefully selecting and rotating crystals. Each player gets the same set of crystals (21 unique shapes).

Water Computer

 Using a 3D printer I have built a water-powered computer. Here is a video:

Here is a diagram of the main component: 

The "inverted output" on the left will be ON when the input is OFF, and OFF when the input is ON. The "amplified output" on the right will be the same state as the input, but will have increased water flow. By redirecting the outputs with tubes, this single component is powerful enough to build any logic circuit or computer. This type of computation is known as fluidics.

Here is the binary half-adder circuit that I built (using five of the above components):

Here are the models for the different parts that I 3D printed:

• transistor - the main logic component
• nozzle - used for releasing water from the milk carton
• connector - used to connect funnels to tubes
• hook - used to provide extra magnet support
• funnel - funnel with a single output
• splitter funnel - funnel with two outputs - this can be used to split one larger stream into two smaller streams

Bitlog

Similar to Turing Paint and Doodle Code, I have released another visual programming language called Bitlog. This is a simulator for electronic logic circuits, represented with bitmap images.

Doodle Code

 I have created a type of barcode called Doodle Code. Similar to QR codes, it can be used to store data.

Turing Paint

 

I have created my own programming language called Turing Paint. It is a visual programming language: programs are represented using images.