Slashdot is powered by your submissions, so send in your scoop

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror

Comment Adventure games (Score 1) 550

My SO wasn't into gaming at all until I intrigued her with adventure games where the context is realistic, a world, story and characters she can relate to (ie. no over-the-top fantasy/futuristic worlds), and an easy learning curve. Games where raw gamer skills aren't important, but where human soft-skills play a bigger role. We're both of us behind the same laptop, solving puzzles together, discussing what to do, about the characters, and so on.
A few games that fit the bill: Secret Files, LA Noire, Broken Sword 1/2, Phantasmagoria. I know it's a far cry from co-op FPS games, but it's a common digital playground we found and both enjoy.

Comment Sounds like a MacBook Pro refresh is coming (Score 1) 203

Intel is resuming shipments of the Intel 6-series chipset for use only in PC system configurations that are not impacted by the design issue. (...) [those systems] will only use the two (unaffected) 6Gbps SATA ports provided by the chipset

Just like Apple's MacBook Pro's, that use one channel for the HDD/SDD and the other for the SuperDrive.

Comment Re:We should applaud Microsoft for security (Score 1) 258

Microsoft's answer to security issues with Windows Phone 7:

1) impose OS license fees to phone manufacturers
2) less manufacturers => less phones
3) less phones => less users
4) less users => less developers
5) less developers => less apps
6) less apps => less users
...
6) no users => no security issues!
7) profit !

Comment Re:From my own experience... (Score 2, Insightful) 823

Unless you can get them to understand the basics of security (...virus scanner, a firewall, something like Revo Uninstaller and maybe Process Explorer)) your fighting a losing battle.

I think you should avoid explaining tech stuff as to an 80+ years old grandpa as much as possible. Perceived complexity is exactly why a lot of senior people won't even touch a computer with a pole stick. I've been recently confronted to the similar problem as the author: give the simplest computer to my grandpa, and teach him how to use it. He already tried using Windows and Mac, but gave up because it was too complicated for him. I hope my experience will help you somehow. First, you have to ask yourself the right questions:

- What exactly does he want to do on his computer?
- What is the best and easiest way to present these functionalities on his screen?
- What time do I have?
And *then only* you can ask yourself what software/hardware you'll use, depending on the answers of the two above questions.
I customized a Xandros EeePC 900 to be even simpler to use than with stock setting. Here's what I personalized:

- Five functionalities: Internet, Email, Writer, Solitaire, Skype. That's five huge buttons on the main screen (no other buttons, there's alt+t terminal for administration)
- Kiosk mode Firefox: fullscreen, back button, home button, print button, font size up/down buttons, close button (and Adblock plus installed)
- Netvibes homepage with local news, weather, wikipedia search, and video search. (no Google, too exotic for my grandpa).
- Disabled reminders, unnecessary tooltips, auto-updates, etc.
- Removed all the unnecessary buttons from OpenOffice, Firefox, Thunderbird, Skype.
- Removed the taskbar, and the maximize/minimize buttons from windows (basically: removed apparent multitasking).
- Configured the power button to be instant on/off (no confirmation screen etc).
- Configured Thunderbird with his email address, ready to be used.

Then comes the teaching part. In my free time I made him a little manual with a lot of screenshots, and spent two hours with him explaining him what he wanted to know, and I used a tutorial approach.

The only downside of my experience is the great amount of time required to customize Xandros and to write the manual, so your solution might might be different depending on the time you have on your hands.
But my grandpa seems to be satisfied with the result. It has been six months since he touched his EeePC for the first time. He uses it everyday now, and never had a crash/problem (yet).

Slashdot Top Deals

"What man has done, man can aspire to do." -- Jerry Pournelle, about space flight

Working...