Originally published at: http://boingboing.net/2016/10/18/compact-laser-measure.html
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You ought to show this gadget to the guy who reviewed utility knives.
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It doesn’t measure anything smaller than 6", so it’s of no use to Donald Trump.
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His hands.
Uh, yeah. That too.
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accurate to 1/8 of an inch. might as well just guess the distance.
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Also, if you want to actually center that painting on the wall, you’ll need a tape measure in addition to the laser doohickey.
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They’ve always struck me as a solution in search of a problem. Probably nice for measuring rooms and such, but I have small children who can be convinced to run the steel tape down the hall. 
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Real estate people use them a lot. Played with one that worked up to 300’, pretty impressive. I’d like to know exactly how they work (not just “measures the delay of a laser pulse”, which would require way too much precision). Edit: seems they do averaging and some sort of phase measurement: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_rangefinder
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Isn’t that exactly what it does? When you press the button theres a soft click as the ir laser fires and the sensor detects the bounce. The visible laser is only used for targeting.
When I was a little kid, I’d love playing with the metal measuring tape. I wouldn’t even need an excuse. It’s a far more satisfying user experience than this
gadgety go to fuck yo’self shit.
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Yeah, but simply timing a return pulse is tricky. Light travels a foot per nanosecond. To get 1/8" resolution means you need to measure down to about .01 ns, or ten picoseconds. AFAIK, that’s beyond the ability of most sensors, especially in a cheap device.
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