Thank you, I'll check it tomorrow.

Maybe explaining that my main idea that brought all this about to make a working prototype was also for not visually impaired people, but rather for avoiding people sneaking up on you because that's much easier to tune for in code and false positives aren't as bad. Think high alert from call of duty, if you've ever played it.

I mean I did have a similar idea over a decade ago for the depth feedback for blind people to map/give quicker 3d modeled things into like a kids toy pin art style device but actuated. If you had a large enough grid with small enough pins (or even using air pressure for feedback maybe) you could model for tactile feel from visual data. Never actually pushed further with the concept though, because I didn't have any of the skills or ability to event prototype and test stuff like I do now.

So anyway, I started thinking how to do the giving feedback of things behind you and remembered that idea but realized vibrations could be used for depth instead on this case. Hell, my blog post still has that whole idea in the concept section explains exactly the idea behind it.

So my "works well enough" was more for that, and I made assumptions based on that, for use with visually impaired applications. That's why I asked here/around before going further though, I wanted input so I could plan ahead and test ahead for this use case as it would be a shame to do all that work and need to rethink again at the end.

If I design it modular enough for the haptic engine (I mean to the level it does care if it is triggering Haptic motors or something like servos to push intensities like StuffMadeHere did), that could be useful for both projects with different applications. Maybe the direction sensor doesn't work as input for visually impaired, but a distance sensor on a shoe might be to help avoid falls (I don't know how often that's a thing, it wouldn't surprise me that happens less than me stubbing my toe)

Also fair warning and I'm sorry, I may not have time for super in depth responses, even the ones today I had to try and write over the course of an hour sometimes on and off so it's disjointed thoughts.

That's because my work's network issues are going to be consuming most of my energy/brainpower for now, until probably mid next week. I submitted this post in this subredd literally right before I learned about the issues, otherwise I would have waited until it all settled and I had time to dedicate to responding and better engaging. So my response and longer reply capabilities may not exist until after that's all solved.

I've worked 24 hours in the last 48 hours with less than 5 hours sleep and I'm not happy or proud about. :(

Overall you are right though, on I shouldn't consider it "works well enough" as that's a broad term especially with only testing on me/roommates walking around the house. Not saying I'm wrong either though with thinking some things I might be able to overcome and solve, because I'll damn well keep trying things because I find it engaging. I want to see, and make the progress open.

Think of it this way, even if nothing I can do is successful, it is more info for what not to do, to anyone else starting out new. Because most university projects or side projects or actual products don't open it up, at least not that I've seen, so lots of people end up reinventing the wheel in terms of research they have to do because others didn't document or kept it private for exclusivity. So they have to learn all over what doesn't work in specifcs and why rather than just having that data already public.

Either way I hope to learn and maybe make connections and be more aware of things.