Daytripper Laser Tripwire Hides All of Your Windows

As described on in its product listing, “Do you always slack off on your computer and worry about getting busted? Not anymore because Daytripper is here to save the day!” Yes, that’s right, no longer to you have to pay attention to your surroundings when checking Reddit or Hackster.io at work, you can now just have this laser tripwire do it for you. Not that we necessarily condone that kind of behavior, or that it conceals your network traffic, but that’s an entirely different can of worms.

The tripwire setup comes as a dual-module system, with a remote mountable transmitter, and a receiver that acts as USB keyboard. This can be configured to either minimize all windows, lock out your computer, or a custom setting which enters ALT + PAUSE when the trigger is tripped, and can be mapped to whatever you want. This third option is perhaps the most interesting, allowing you to assign macros etc with a program like AutoHotkey on Windows, through System Preferences on MacOS, or “Oh I’m sure you’ll figure it out 😉” on Linux.

The transmitter module uses a laser time-of-flight sensor to determine distance to the target, and can detect objects at up to 4ft (120cm). Transmission range is 330ft (100m) in the open. It’s rechargeable via USB-C, and will give you 40 hours of usage time before it has to be plugged in again. While it looks useful (depending on your definition) as designed, it could certainly serve as great inspiration for other projects as well. Firmware and PCB files are available on GitHub for your perusal.