On Fri, Nov 10, 2006 at 06:50:59PM -0400, Ben Armstrong wrote: > On Fri, 10 Nov 2006 09:26:56 -0800 > Andrew Sackville-West <andrew@farwestbilliards.com> wrote: > > That age is definitely difficult. My desire would be to see, not > > necessarily a different DE, but perhaps an appropriate theme. For > > example, a very simplified desktop using large, fun icons and > > stripping out some of the things that are more complicated for little > > kids: right clicks, middle clicks, nested menus and so forth. The > > right combination of look and feel could be built pretty easily (he > > says without any thought...) by theming one of the existing DE's or > > WM's. Populated with the right packages under a meta-package and it > > should be pretty straightforward. > > Sure. Any takers? heh heh. I'll do what I can, which isn't much, but I've got a crufty old box that I"m in process on redoing and could dedicate it for testing stuff. Hopefully there are some suitable icons out there already that could be recombined/resized meaningfully. I'll poke at it, but I've not much time at the moment. :( > > > 1. A big, fun simple interface > > 2. Simplified mouse interaction (something most WM's can handle, I > > think) > > 3. A set of basic apps - paint, draw, type, simple games. > > 4. maybe eliminate key-bindings. > > 5. passwordless login for kids accounts > > 6. maybe a seperate set of post-install scripts for setting things up > > in a kid friendly way. > > > > that's just some of my thoughts. > > Good. I have linked this thread from http://wiki.debian.org/DebianJr so we can develop these ideas and perhaps produce something. cool. > > > I don't think there's necessarily a dearth of apps for kids that age, > > its more of an interface problem. Really small children do what the OP > > mentioned above -- bash the keyboard and sometimes watch what > > happens. Maybe some kind of kiosk setup would be in order? > > As I've said earlier, we're not the only ones who might need a kiosk setup. Is there anything like this in Debian or any existing group more suited to taking on this task? I'd like to remain focused on those aspects of the problem that pertain uniquely to children. IIRC there is some kiosk stuff at debain-admin...not much. As far as how it pertains to kids, I think that having the right set-up out of the box is the key. The less parents have to futz with it the better... that's why I suggested a kiosk setup. You could do away with a DE altogether and just run a self-respawning X app out of .xsession say. just a rough idea. > > > Have the > > thing boot up running a paint program on the root window (is that > > possible? maybe) and then overlay some icons on top of it for > > launching other stuff like some games. That way, the kids can get > > immediate results by just clicking and dragging on the desktop -- look > > I can draw! and then when they inadvertently click on one of the icons > > they get something else. > > What do you think of gcompris? It embeds tuxpaint. It is a > self-contained environment with activities for kids. haven't seen it, but will look... okay, just a quick glance, but it looks good. could we create a dpkg-reconfigure situation for some deb meta package that would allow selecting an age level for the overall package? even zero in on which users get what setup? and then put in simple .xsessions or appropriate configs so that each kids account creates a different session? configure for 1-3 yr olds would launch a windowless/full-screen gcompris, 3-5 yr old would get a big puffy icon set with desktop links to gcompris, but other freestanding stuff too... 6-10 yr olds get a simplified but full-featured desktop etc etc . > > > I think for the 1-3 crowd this might not be true -- when it breaks its > > broken and they throw it away or cry about it... your experience may > > vary :) but definitely by 5 this is true. by 9 they are ready to fix > > what they've broken and maybe fix what others have broken. > > Sure. When the kids were younger, we held our kids on our laps and navigated from app to app for them, guiding them to use the system properly. Completely unattended use isn't recommended at this age. At least not with the DE and apps we have today. agreed. ALthough we've often put our 3 yr olds in front of an age appropriate game and let them at it for small bits of time. If you can control the underlying X session pretty tightly, then you'd minimize the potential damage... all my rushed thoughts while waiting for the excrement to hit rotational atmospheric re-director. :) A
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