Re: What I need for my kids
On Sat, 11 Nov 2006 21:27:09 +0100
Milan Zamazal <pdm@debian.org> wrote:
> Installing a
> kid-proof environment is a difficult task and continuous fixing it is
> complete waste of time. Computers should work for us and not the other
> way round :-). So I think Debian Jr. should definitely provide means to
> save that redundant work.
Somehow we managed to get by without much work fixing broken things when our kids were that young. I'm trying to think what we had back then. For one thing, the desktop was a whole lot simpler than a modern day desktop. Some years ago we were using WindowMaker for all of the kids. Once I set up icon boxes and locked them to prevent accidental deletion, the only thing to worry about was kids firing up and/or minimizing many redundant copies of random apps.
Tux Paint has a neat feature I'd like to see in more kids' apps that helps with that problem. Recognizing that child users are impatient and may click to launch Tux Paint multiple times while they're waiting for it to come up, it sets a timer on the first launch and refuses to start more instances until the timer runs out.
I wonder if an extremely simple wm that makes efficient use of screenspace and user input, such as one designed for a handheld device might be suitable for very young kids. I know of matchbox. Want to give that a try?
> As for Freevo, I agree it might be of wider interest, so I'll ask about
> it on debian-devel. I might take the effort to put it in Debian, but I
> wouldn't like to do it unless there's some clear interest in it and
> possible help.
Great. Thanks.
Ben
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