Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

The boast about Puppy Linux being "grandpa-friendly" has always made me laugh, but I let it pass. I know that the only grandfathers who are capable of managing Puppy Linux, or any Linux for that matter, are ones who worked in the software, engineering, or IT business. But now I found an article that proves my point. It's actually in regards to COVID-19, but the point is still valid. The relevant quote is "Many people in that age group don’t have computers, smartphones, email accounts or the tech savvy to sign themselves up through online portals."

It's always amazed me that many people in the software business don't understand that competency in software is a semi-rare talent, like being proficient in music. Many people think that computers operate via black magic, and that's why smart phones are so popular, because people want the benefits without having to deal with computer-ese.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/for-s ... r-BB1dqIiP

73% of the population have an IQ below 110.

And I thought my 111 IQ was a bad thing

@barquest - Puppy can be remastered fairly easily so that less IT aware older folk can use it.
I am an age pensioner, as are my parents (in their 90s), who use a version of ScPup64 I've curated for them. Surfing, email, youtube etc options keep their world broader. Can even use hdmi to their TV so they can crank the volume & remove hearing aids. They did a zoom agm late last year - I just started them up via anydesk, which I use if they have issues. None of us has a degree. So yes, puppy can be set for grandpas.

You go to a newer forum but your sins are never forgiven.

" 73% of the population have an IQ below 110."

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Compared to Windows 10 Puppy is just a pleasure.

Setting up Windows 10.

http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic. ... 26#1057726

Chris.

"Is Puppy really grandpa-friendly?"

No. Nothing Un*x related (Un*x > Linux > Puppy) is "friendly" because "complexity" is not "friendly". It takes time, some effort, some wit, some help and respect to master (even Puppy). IF you deliver, THEN it's "friendly". If you don't, then it's not. As life itself, I'd say

Easy to use like older Windows systems like Windows XP/Windows 98. Main benefit however is that one can basically isolate the operating system from user mishaps. Frugal install/setup configured for specific use (system changes saved to an adrv)/running without a savefile and bingo you almost have an unbreakable, secure system. My 86-year old dad will not be able to use a computer any other way.

amethyst wrote: Sat Feb 06, 2021 6:31 am

Main benefit however is that one can basically isolate the operating system from user mishaps. Frugal install/setup configured for specific use (system changes saved to an adrv)/running without a savefile and bingo you almost have an unbreakable, secure system. My 86-year old dad will not be able to use a computer any other way.

Ditto 89-yo mother. For whom even a basic TV remote control is considered too technically daunting. Let alone 'simple' mobile phones.

A 'configured in stone' (pre-configured frugal with no saving) Puppy installed into a laptop or tablet perhaps with just a chrome browser with voice search option added - such as https://chrome.google.com/webstore/deta ... gj/related and the simplicity/resilience can be great for those with frail finger control, poorer hearing/eyesight. By comparison even 'simple' phones nowadays can be way too complicated for some 80+. Puppy provides a means where their more savvy 60+ sons/daughters or grandchildren can create a bespoke Puppy to get their parent/grandparent 'going'. "Don't worry, if anything goes wrong " ... just power-cycle (frugal). i.e. stage 1 learn how to power on/off. Modelling paint or even just a written paper tab stuck down with clear sellotape are helpful.

Stage 2 ... initially loads directly to a browser to learn basic mouse/touchpad/touchscreen/keyboard/voice controls ... searching/viewing, and the delight of their own capabilities is a attractor to use. "Plumber in Wimbledon" ... was one of our most voice searched item some time back (not that we needed one). Soon, with interest encouraged usage you'll find you can add tray/desktop icons for other simple controls such as changing volume levels.

Then onto stage 3, 'expert' enough where the range of options/functions can be further extended. Such as extending to have both a browser and web cam viewer options - to see who is at the front door, and/or 'contact son/daughter' options. I've even coded telnet controls into the Virgin Media box so that regular channels can be switched to directly via desktop icons (Drama, BBC News, Film 4 ...etc.).

From experience you have to introduce technology real-slow and really-basic. Too much too quick and that can induce a 'too technical for me' barrier where all interest is lost. We have the stacks of 'simple' mobile phones, tv controllers ...etc. in bottom draws to validate that. Also sons/daughters are better mentors than the grandchildren - who tend to jump in to 'show' rather than letting them do it for themselves, resulting in yet another bottom-drawed device.

Hi All
In my case I grew up when personal computing began.
So if and when I am in my 80's at least I will not need my (If and when He or She is born) grandchild to come over
and show me how to use my Linux Box, Smart Phone and most importantly Stop my VCR flashing the numbers 12:00

Best Regards
John

packetteer wrote: Sat Feb 06, 2021 12:43 pm

Hi All
In my case I grew up when personal computing began.
So if and when I am in my 80's at least I will not need my (If and when He or She is born) grandchild to come over
and show me how to use my Linux Box, Smart Phone and most importantly Stop my VCR flashing the numbers 12:00

Best Regards
John

Perhaps not John. But you may be in the dark when it comes to using the CCVR (corneal cerebral Virtual Reality interface)

How far are we away from being able to replicate/store ones memories. If those memories were then transferred into the 'mind' of a dolphin, and then later re-sync'd back again. Or simply transferred into a 'disposable' "box" that if lost (death) could be reverted/restored into a replacement "box" using the last available backup.

Oh what religious/social issues! Everyone living forever in forms of their own choosing.

Inter-stellar travel, where your clock rate is slowed down to 1 tick per year such that a 4 million light year journey seemingly occurred at beyond the speed of light. And where your body could be adapted to whatever environmental conditions.

Occurring contemporaneously with events in my country, rufwoof's recent posts --and others on this thread-- got me thinking. I've concluded that Einstein's guess that the Universe was static [and would later have to include a fudge in his equations] was correct when he reached it. But God took a moment to reflect and then created Dark Energy so that the Universe would now rapidly expand and the Human Race wouldn't be able to travel fast enough to entirely screw it up.

mikeslr wrote: Sat Feb 06, 2021 10:47 pm

Occurring contemporaneously with events in my country, rufwoof's recent posts --and others on this thread-- got me thinking. I've concluded that Einstein's guess that the Universe was static [and would later have to include a fudge in his equations] was correct when he reached it. But God took a moment to reflect and then created Dark Energy so that the Universe would now rapidly expand and the Human Race wouldn't be able to travel fast enough to entirely screw it up.

Hold on to your coco, Mike .. They're now saying that dark energy may not even be a thing. They think it may be an observational bias introduced by data sampling only 1 direction in the night sky.

@ jafadmin
It’s all Your fault. The Future is wishful thinking; the Past a memory of an illusion. There is only the Present which You, alone, hold fleetingly in Your imagination.
Ah for the good old days when the World was flat and bounded by the horizon; and gods could be placated with a shiny bauble. or a little wine and smoke.

in my opinion, depending of the PC and browser, not any more:

in the first years of Puppy, it did include skype but there is no possibility any more in 32 bit!

It depends who grandpa is.

You can make it easier for him.

The experience and talent on this forum is noteworthy, but once you get sufficiently into a group you notice its qualities, and one of them in Puppy World is JWM chauvinism which is decidedly not grandpa-friendly.

I would start grandpa on a different windows manager.

JASpup wrote: Thu Feb 11, 2021 11:22 am

It depends who grandpa is.
...
I would start grandpa on a different windows manager.

You mean like twm, i3 or dwm?
Some grandpas and grandmas could even feel very much at home in the tty without X, like in the 70's and 80's.
Don't underestimate the older generations.

the first terminal I ever worked on said:
"Ready"
that was the prompt and the terminal was a Teletype 33 in a room/closet next to the headmaster's office in my junior high school 8th grade 1975-76....stayed after school to use it...there were just 2 of us interested...one of us went on later to write some very well known software........I walked home 4 miles 3-4 times a week in the dark to get time on that machine.

RSTS/E operating system, PDP-11/70 mini-mainframe with Digital Corp. BASIC and FORTRAN on board.

The IT guys were like high priests ..... we had an assembler as well

foxpup wrote: Thu Feb 11, 2021 12:59 pm

JASpup wrote: Thu Feb 11, 2021 11:22 am

It depends who grandpa is.
...
I would start grandpa on a different windows manager.

You mean like twm, i3 or dwm?
Some grandpas and grandmas could even feel very much at home in the tty without X, like in the 70's and 80's.
Don't underestimate the older generations.

I'm usually being open-minded before I decide a judgement is necessary. weird personality quirk, cultural indoctrination

I mean like XFCE or LXDE.

https://www.lifewire.com/best-linux-des ... ts-4120912

JASpup wrote: Thu Feb 11, 2021 2:14 pm

I mean like XFCE or LXDE.

I thought you were thinking along these lines
and I think you are right for most. Sure.

There are some Puppys that come with XFCE or LXDE.

JASpup wrote: Thu Feb 11, 2021 2:14 pm

I mean like XFCE or LXDE.

Especially XFCE with whisker menu. It provides a very intuitive Graphical User Inter-face.
As I'm so used to the jwm-rox combination, I haven't used xfce or lxde for a while and don't recall if, with desktop-drive launchers being absent, their menus provide an 'in your face' way to mount/unmount drives/partitions. But if so, a really great project would be to package such alternate Window-Managers as a udrv.sfs: [wdrv.sfs being an easily remembered acronym for a wine package]. [taersh has been developing the facility by which Puppies can use additional 'alphabet' SFSes: file-systems which, if present, will be automatically loaded on bootup].

I figured out how to use the remote control the cable company gives you.
I still think it has buttons that just do nothing and the cable company support have no idea what they do!
Computer interfaces and especially the Puppy Linux desktop is easy!
Windows 10 interface is totally a piece of junk

mikeslr wrote: Thu Feb 11, 2021 3:01 pm

JASpup wrote: Thu Feb 11, 2021 2:14 pm

I mean like XFCE or LXDE.

Especially XFCE with whisker menu. It provides a very intuitive Graphical User Inter-face.
As I'm so used to the jwm-rox combination, I haven't used xfce or lxde for a while and don't recall if, with desktop-drive launchers being absent, their menus provide an 'in your face' way to mount/unmount drives/partitions. But if so, a really great project would be to package such alternate Window-Managers as a udrv.sfs: [wdrv.sfs being an easily remembered acronym for a wine package]. [taersh has been developing the facility by which Puppies can use additional 'alphabet' SFSes: file-systems which, if present, will be automatically loaded on bootup].

I'm still new to the system SFS, have only brushed the surface. XFCE has desktop drive launchers, but JWM's are superior. There's gui refinement, but the over-arching reason to use XFCE is JWMs arcane menu system.

mikeslr wrote: Thu Feb 11, 2021 3:01 pm

But if so, a really great project would be to package such alternate Window-Managers as a udrv.sfs:

https://sourceforge.net/projects/lxpup/ ... /Desktops/

Ivy Bean (8 September 1905 – 28 July 2010) was a British internet personality, known for being the oldest person in the world on both Facebook and Twitter.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivy_Bean
In 2007 she first accessed the internet via a computer given by social services to her care home.[2] In 2008, at the age of 102, Bean joined Facebook, making her one of its oldest members.

If she could handle using Windows 10.
No problem using Puppy Linux!

Is puppy Grandpa Friendly? Well it depends on who your grandpa/ma is. Successfully using any computing device including phones and tablets, depends on experience and then basic ease of use. For instance, I use android based phones and tablets and therefore Apple devices are a real challenge. My experience with users tells me that any operating system can be setup to be easy to use if the users needs and ability are taken into account and part of that means you have to hide the things that will get them in trouble. My 89 year old neighbor lady (grandma) gets up every day and starts her Windows 10 computer, checks and sends email, does her budget with Quicken, and checks her bank and a few other sites with her browser. Her son-in-law set the system up and the desktop has only those icons she needs. On the other hand, my brother-in-law (grandpa) who has a PHD in chemistry, can barely find the on-off switch. It's not that he can't, it's just that personal computing doesn't satisfy a need he wants to fill. So, the desire to succeed and experience trumps IQ in this case.

Choosing between Windows, who have made their OS increasingly more complex, convoluted, and easier to corrupt, and Puppy, I think it is easier for Puppy to be Grandpa Friendly. Here's just a few things that would need to be done to make puppy senior friendly:

-clear the desktop, leave only the icons required
-clear the menus & taskbar, same as for the desktop, hide anything that can get them in trouble
-BIG icons, many seniors have both poor eyesight and/or tremors (shaking hands)
-slow down the mouse speed, helps compensate for tremors
-slow down the double click speed, tremors compensation again
-include a remote help application like Anydesk so they can get assistance if needed

In the end, the average user doesn't really care about the OS, they just want something that does what they want to accomplish.

A properly configured pupplet might be a good project to make a truly Grandpa Friendly pup.

wizard