A Haptic Clock for Light Sleepers

Like, presumably, many readers, Michael Kafarowski is a light sleeper and sometimes has a hard time going back to sleep after waking up. The question then becomes: what time is it, and is it even worth trying to get more rest? Normally, this would mean forcing your eyes open to check his phone, but Kafarowski decided to pursue another option that he’s calling the No-Eye Clock, which uses haptic feedback via a vibrating motor for time indication.

While still under development, the idea here is that when the clock is triggered, it gives feedback through a vibrating motor to indicate the time. The device is triggered by a button in v0.1; however, Kafarowski found that this was difficult to push while maintaining the proper contact to sense vibrations, so an IR emitter/phototransistor will be implemented in the next prototype. He also plans to add audio feedback, which may be more distracting sleep-wise, but likely easier for the uninitiated. He’ll even use a dedicated TI DRV2605LDGSR IC in that implementation to keep vibrations crisp.

It’s a really neat concept, and it will be interesting to see this continue to develop into what Kafarowski hopes will be a production-ready product. Perhaps we’ll see these or a similar implementation for sale in the future, either for those that have trouble sleeping, or for those that need a non-visual time indicator for whatever reason.