Computers

On Technological Literacy of Parents

Yet again I see an article about children being banned from using mobile phones before they are thirteen years of age and once again I find myself asking, “but what if parents had the required digital literacy to help children and teens?” and “What if teachers had that digital literacy too?” Ireland has yet, again said that it would ban children younger from 13 from using smart phones. In my eyes this is a mistake because it fails to address the technological illiteracy of their parents, and children, handicapping them for life in the 21st century.

Playing with Computers or Machines

How many computers do you have at hand. Years ago I used to have two computers. A Mac Book Air and a Mac Book Pro. Eventually I sold the Mac Book Air and just used the Pro. I went to an event with the Pro and it was stolen so for a few days I was without any computer.

I then bought a much cheaper Mac Book Pro and since then my collection of computers has grown. My work horse from 2016 onwards was a Mac Book Pro, but during the pandemic I got an HP machine running windows. Now it’s running Ubuntu. I also have a chrome book as a spare.

The Longevity of a Mac

I have a 2016 Mac Book Pro that I still use daily despite it being old, and vintage by the time Autumn comes. The reasons for which I kept my mac for so long are that it’s about budget. I don’t want to spend 1600 CHF to get a mediocre computer that a cheaper computer can mirror.

Cheap Alternatives Like the Pi5

For web browsing a pi5 with 8gb of ram is sufficient to browse the web, write blog posts and more. A new Mac Book Pro would be more performant, and less prone to crashes due to overheating and ram saturation. It’s also 16 times cheaper.

Recycled Computers and RAM

I don’t like to go recycling for two reasons. I usually end my daily walk just at the time when the recycling centre opens during week days so I don’t want to go back and spend time that I could invest in other chores in something as relaxed as recycling. The second reason is that because traffic is bad I usually prefer not to be one of the cars driving down a narrow path when it is not urgent to do so.