Damn Ergonomics

Paul Brown @ 2006-04-10T00:36:00Z

After having my hard drive renamed “iywemsndfgouy” a few times, I got a recommendation for AlphaBaby from Sam (thanks!), and the kid likes it. A lot. AlphaBaby displays shapes and letters and plays sounds in response to keypresses but otherwise locks the machine down. (Nonetheless, Emme has managed to hit the magic key combination ctrl-alt-cmd-q a few times with her palm and middle finger and get back to renaming desktop items.) My old 17“ G4 Powerbook is a downstairs email terminal about 50% of the time and running AlphaBaby for Emme the other 50%. (Fortunately, she's not talking yet to ask for a MacBook Pro...) She has a grand time massaging the keyboard and watching the shapes. She has actually started to peck at the keys with a finger as her manual dexterity improves, but it's never very long before she notices the power button on the upper right — round, shiny, textured, and inviting. It just looks like it should be pushed, so it gets pushed. Repeatedly. Half the time, she suspends the machine; half the time, she shuts it down. We'll see how long it takes for her to get over the urge to push it.

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Comment from neal @ 2006-04-10T12:19:43Z # permalink

Paul, Sounds like a great idea!! Do they make alphababy for pc as well or only for Mac? Now if only I could teach my son to NOT push the power button when he walks over to the PC!! Regards, neal

Comment from Paul Brown @ 2006-04-10T17:04:39Z # permalink

Emme's already identified that the power button on the front of my G5 looks just like the one on the PowerBook. Of course, as far as she knows, it just causes daddy to get out of his chair...