• silenium_dev@feddit.org
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      5 months ago

      If every single dispenser is a self contained unit, which then is put together in groups of how many different kinds of drink you need? That seems cheaper than having each group of dispensers individually built because all displays have to be wired up to a single computer. This way a single dispenser can be replaced quickly without needing a technician to come or replacing the whole thing.

    • wheezy@lemmy.ml
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      5 months ago

      It’s probably literally cheaper to have a cheap device that supports one display than a single device capable of supporting multiple displays.

      It also simplifies the design. You don’t need different hardware requirements or software configs for a slushy system of 3 or 4 or 5 flavors. You just have a single design for each slushy device.

      On top of that, when a device is restarting or failed it only has a single failure. All of the other flavors are displayed.

      Also, for the other “why not a sticker” comments. Having a digital display does have its advantages. You may not want your chain of stores having tacky hand drawn labels by a lazy employee. This prevents that. You can include the price in the display later if you want to. Ensuring you charge more for that “limited time” flavor and you don’t have to send stickers to each store.

      Also, the cost of these displays is so little in comparison to the mechanical parts that operate the actual machine it’s likely worth the it for the flexibility in display.

      Also, digital displays catch the eyes more. You’re gonna get more people that notice a flashy machine and think “I’m in the mood for a slurpy”. That alone is likely worth any other cost.

      Capitalism doesn’t have to “make sense” in terms of design or simplicity. It often doesn’t. It chooses the things that return the most profit. It’s not reason based in “logic” it’s reason based in “profit”.

      • SparroHawc@lemmy.zip
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        5 months ago

        It also has the benefit of being able to show metrics and diagnostics right there without having to connect it to another device.

      • Axolotl@feddit.it
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        5 months ago

        Also, for the other “why not a sticker” comments. Having a digital display does have its advantages. You may not want your chain of stores having tacky hand drawn labels by a lazy employee. This prevents that. You can include the price in the display later if you want to. Ensuring you charge more for that “limited time” flavor and you don’t have to send stickers to each store.

        Ear me out: you print them, crazy right?!

        • wheezy@lemmy.ml
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          5 months ago

          You don’t have to send stickers to each store.

          So purchase a nice color printer for each store? Or have an employee go to print at staples when you want to change labels?

          Like, “just print them” is a lot more effort than you are making it sound to avoid the use of an extremely cheap screen.

          There is a reason all vehicles put a big ass display in their car now even though people prefer actual buttons. Screens and software are dirt cheap. A printer with moving mechanical parts is expensive. Using employee time is expensive. Shipping is expensive.

          • Axolotl@feddit.it
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            5 months ago

            You can pay other companies to print for you duh, they will print you anything for dirt cheap, it’s not like a company can’t afford it lmao

    • tempest@lemmy.ca
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      5 months ago

      Might be a single computer that’s just the primary display.

      Nothing in that boot sequence is a deal breaker it’s just missing an Internet connection I think.

      • The_Decryptor@aussie.zone
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        5 months ago

        Nah, storage is fried.

        People always focus on systemd whenever this is posted, but all systemd is saying is that it can’t read the service files when it tries to start something. Earlier on the kernel is complaining about I/O errors as well.

        • tempest@lemmy.ca
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          5 months ago

          Oh yeah youre right, I was squinting real hard to try and read that on on a phone and was only looking at the bottom

    • neidu3@sh.itjust.works
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      5 months ago

      A raspy W is like 20 bucks each, and has a tiny footprint. Cheaper than the screen itself, probably, and simpler than having to reconfigure the amount of displays based on available flavors in the setup.

      • Miaou@jlai.lu
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        5 months ago

        God I remember buying an RPi for less than 10€ this company really screwed up their product.

        • Synapse@lemmy.world
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          5 months ago

          The only Raspberry Pi cheaper than 10€ is the Raspberry Pi Zero (no wifi) that launch at 5€/$5, the Raspberry Pi Zero W (with wifi) launch at 10€/$10, both in 2015. Raspberry Pi 1, 2 and 3 launched at 35€ and since the 4 and 5, it’s a bit more complicated because they have different RAM options. Today, the RPi4 1GB is sold 37,90€. Availability is more of an issue. But in terms of pricing it’s not bad ! I have the feeling, people’s expectations for a Raspberry Pi are a bit distorted. No, you don’t get a top of the line gaming PC for 40€… But even a RPi2 is still good for a tone of useful projects!

    • HugeNerd@lemmy.ca
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      5 months ago

      The real reason for modern complexity is to create more bullshit jobs and ensure money keeps flowing.

      If we just said “enough”, which is true, we’d have a leisure society and people would have time to start thinking.

      We can’t have that, so instead we have Linux soft drink dispensers that need multi-core CPUs, containers, VMs, gigabytes of RAM, SSDs, always-on internet connection, and endless hardware upgrades to dispense carbonated water and sugar syrup.

      Something a mechanical switch from 1855 can do.

      • NiHaDuncan@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        That’s the actual wild part; using a simple (~$5) SOC to support a dynamic, remotely manageable, UI for an industrial appliance as in this case is reasonable. But dedicated a system per dispenser head is wild.

        I guess it could possibly be deemed to be worth it for an ‘industrial’ application like this as it could reduce per-head downtime if just one fails. But man, that’s a lot of silicon for such a task.

    • mr_anny@sopuli.xyz
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      5 months ago

      Whenever you change the product or the visual of it is changes, you change the sticker, this is automatic.

      If I were to make these devices I would make it so that changing the BiB to different flavor would automatically change the screen.

        • Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world
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          5 months ago

          Design, get design approved, print inserts, package inserts, ship inserts, give lead time for most stores to receive inserts, swap inserts, discard old inserts.

          As opposed to design, get design approved, send.

          • CaptPretentious@lemmy.world
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            5 months ago

            And the product just what, magically shows up? If you’re swapping out the flavor, that’s a whole process, not something you’re doing on a whim. All promotional material would either be shipped ahead of time or with the product. We’ve been able to label buttons and products for a long time w/o using an independent computer + screen to do it.

            • Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world
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              5 months ago

              Pepsi isn’t going to print an insert for every machine. They’re gonna print an insert that fits the machine you have to rent from Pepsi. Same with Coke.

            • Pika@sh.itjust.works
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              5 months ago

              I would assume that in most cases, they arent running a mid day update, they would give prior notice that over night X will happen so make sure product is what the label is in the morning.

              Being said, I also assume there is some custom-ability to the screens, as in they are probably touch screens or have a a physical button behind the control to allow to cycle through available products to ensure the right product is displayed. That or there is a network controller somewhere on premise (potentially linked to their menu manager) that decides what screen displays what.

              • CaptPretentious@lemmy.world
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                5 months ago

                It’s a 7-Eleven Slurpee machine. If a new flavor was coming, it wouldn’t be a surprise, and they’d know well in advance (well managment would). Now I don’t frequent 7-Eleven so I can’t say how often they swap out flavors, but most places tend to just maintain outside of special promotions or discontinued products.

                There’d be no reason for those to be touchscreens, they’re not like the Coke Freestyle that lets people pick. Those Slurpee machines are manually controlled by the customer. It being a touchscreen or a server somewhere… is needless over-engineering and a bunch of e-waste to replace an insert. A physical insert never had a CVE. A phsyical insert doesn’t need tech support (both for the OS + application + networking + hardware) on top of the maintenance for the machine (the parts that cool and make the Slurpee). A physical insert cannot crash. The only thing adding a screen + Linux + whatever else does is make the presentation a bit cleaner (at an increase in cost and waste). This is like the places that replaced the glass doors with giant screens (sorry for linking to anything Reddit) https://www.reddit.com/r/chicago/comments/p8s7ab/the_cvs_on_irvingpulaski_installed_these_screens/#lightbox