2011-03-30

Pivot screen fun

I used to think pivot monitors were only good for playing Pac-Man in portrait position. But why restrict ourselves to just the landscape and portrait positions?



Since the monitor only knows two states, I had to resort to a little trick. I attached my phone to the back of the monitor and wrote an application that broadcasts orientation data from the phone's accelerometer on the network. On the computer, another application receives the data and rotates the teapot accordingly. (Here's the source code to the phone application and the teapot application if you're interested.)

What I really wanted to do was to make the desktop rotate with all the windows. I think it should be possible with Compiz, but I'm pretty sure it would prove difficult enough for me to lose interest halfway through. So, a teapot for now.