I support the above post.

I have a six year old son with ADHD, and sadly I had no choice but to put him on medication. Do I like it? No, of course not. Was it the right choice? I definitely believe so. He was failing PREP. Yes ... the very first year of school, and he was failing because he couldn't focus. He was also highly disruptive in class and ended up spending several hours per week in the school office. However, all the teachers love him because he's a very sweet little boy (their words, not mine). A lot of people believe that ADHD medication (such as Ritalin) is a sedative - it's not, it's a stimulant. It's equivalent to a couple of cups of strong coffee. The problem is that people with ADHD have had their brains develop such that they cannot focus on certain inputs to the exclusion of others as most people can. Try standing in the middle of a room at a party or a night club, and talk to the person with you. Most people can manage it. Someone with ADHD and no medication finds it incredibly difficult to remain focused on the conversation, because they can also hear the other conversations in the room, and the music, and the person clinking a glass together in the neighbouring kitchen. All at once, and without the inherent ability to exclude unwanted inputs. The purpose of Ritalin is to speed up the brain so that the ADHD person can get all those inputs and actually process them.

It's actually genetic. My brother has ADD too. He's a successful masseuse now because it's a single task, in a quiet room, that can keep his attention. Don't ever ask him to hold a ladder for you because he'll wander off to look at a butterfly by the time you get to the top (yep, this actually happened when he was 21).

Autism seems to be related, though they don't know how. I have an autistic child too, and that's a whole other ballgame. But just because you are lucky enough to have a "typical" brain which can't even CONCEIVE of these different mental pathways, doesn't mean that these conditions don't exist. They can't conceive of what it's like for you either. All they know is that people are incredibly intolerant of what is - to them - perfectly normal.

Having said all that, I have to be very careful of their technology input, especially since autistic minds can struggle to differentiate from what they see on TV and what is actually real. They probably watch more TV and play more computer games than they should, but to be honest that's better for them than a mother having a nervous breakdown. I am strict about what they are allowed to watch though. Most children's TV is completely out. Ben 10? Forget it. Documentaries? Go for your life. They love things like Dirty Jobs and Mythbusters. My six year old probably beat you playing Starcraft 2 last night. ;) It encourages keeping track of various things and strategising.

I disagree completely. I install gvim under Windows (yes, it's vim not vi, and I'll admit that vi is much less productive but then you can't compare vi to emacs when it comes to binary size) so that when I need to edit something FAST I can. My husband integrates it with Visual Studio for the same reason - most of the time he uses the VS IDE, but nothing beats vim for mass refactoring of code. Control sequences, which is what other editors use, are slower for fast touch typists like myself. Touch typists don't look at their fingers, and try to stay at the home row at all times. Moving a hand to a mouse is a massive slow-down. I *prefer* modal editing and switched *to* vim. I put bash into vi mode because I can't stand it in the default emacs mode.

For two-finger typists, sure, vi-based editors are a poor choice. For use-the-mouse people, vi-based editors are a poor choice. For people who heavily customise their work environment to maximise productivity vi-based editors can be an excellent choice. I bet I can start four apps with my keyboard - even one at a time - faster than you can start two with a mouse. Fluxbox for the win!