How to clean up a white keyboard?

On 9/17/2020 4:10 AM, Frank Slootweg wrote:
Char Jackson wrote:
On Wed, 16 Sep 2020 09:25:13 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:

On 9/16/2020 9:15 AM, Char Jackson wrote:
[...]

Yep, PS/2, and the cables are really long. They're coiled up like a
telephone cord, (any kids in here may not know that phones used to have a
cord),

They still do--at least all the ones (five of them) in my house, except
for the cell phones my wife and I have.

Even kids may have parents who who still use land lines.

I haven't had a corded phone since the late 80's, I think. I still have a
5-phone wireless set, but they are in a drawer and are at risk of going
into the next box for Goodwill.

My house isn't even wired for corded phones. They put TV coax in when they
built it, and I've added Cat6 Ethernet cable myself, but there are no phone
lines anywhere.

My house (appartment) isn't wired for corded phones either, but I
still have a (cordless) phone [1], which is connected to the telephone
jack of the modem of my (coax cable) ISP. So you don't have to have
special wiring to still have a 'landline'/'fixed phone'/whatever. Of
course the difference with a *real* old-style 'analog' landline is that
things stop working in case of a power failure.


POTS lines stop working in case of a power failure? Not in my experience.


--
Ken

On 9/17/2020 7:20 AM, Ken Blake wrote:
On 9/16/2020 7:43 PM, Char Jackson wrote:
On Wed, 16 Sep 2020 08:06:13 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:

On 9/15/2020 3:34 PM, Char Jackson wrote:
On Tue, 15 Sep 2020 14:43:26 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:

On 9/15/2020 12:38 PM, Frank Slootweg wrote:
Ken Blake wrote:
[...]

I'm different in this respect from almost all the rest of you. If my
keyboard gets old and and dirty, I just toss it out and buy a new one.
They're inexpensive, unless you want a very fancy expensive one; I don't.

I would like to do that too. The problem is that the rest of the
laptop is attached to it! :-)


One of the many disadvantages of using a laptop instead of a desktop.

Why not both? The machine in front of me is primarily a laptop. When I need
to use a desktop, I RDP to it.


Having both is fine if you want to use a desktop at home and a laptop
for traveling. I see no advantage to using a laptop by itself at home,
or using both at home. In fact, to me there's no advantage to having
more than one computer of any kind for use at home.

I travel for work, or at least I did before the current situation arrived,
so I use my laptop for work. It makes sense to me to use it when I'm
working from home, as well, to maintain a sense of continuity. So my laptop
is my work machine, and when I want to do something not related to work,
I'd like to simultaneously use a desktop, so I RDP to it. I view the
desktop full screen on a second monitor.

In addition to a laptop and a remote desktop, I also have dozens of virtual
PCs on the desktop, (not all running simultaneously), so I frequently have
multiple virtual Windows PCs running, each doing its own thing. Partly,
this personal use of multiple VMs is a 'because I can' thing, but it's also
extremely handy. It's nice to be able to group tasks together on different
VMs rather than having everything trying to run on a single desktop.

My wife only uses a laptop at home. She likes to be able to move from the
bedroom to the living room to the breakfast nook to her sewing room, etc.

Laptops are more expensive than desktops, harder and more expensive to
repair or upgrade, prone to being dropped and broken, and prone to being
stolen.

If the two most common upgrades are memory and drives, then laptops are
probably easier to upgrade. Usually there's a single screw or other
fastener that allows a door to swing open, allowing direct access to memory
or drives. For other things, like video cards and other expansion cards,
desktops are easier. Also, within the house I don't think there's an
appreciable risk of theft. In the event of a house fire, in theory we could
grab the laptops on the way out. I hope not to test that theory.


In theory, yes. In practice, I'm not so sure. You might need to get out
of the house as quickly as possible.

I also have several fairly valuable instruments.


Sorry, I accidentally omitted a word. That should be "*musical*
instruments."



I'm not sure what I
would grab first if I had the choice.

And of course, a house fire could occur when nobody's home.



They are also more prone to being damaged by overheating (at
least they used to be; I'm not sure about current laptops). I also don't
like their smaller screens (not even the 17" laptops; I use two 24"
screens on my desktop). And I hate touchpads and on-screen keyboards. I
don't even like the regular keyboards on most laptops.

I never use RDP. If I want to access another computer I use TeamViewer.

Within a LAN, I like RDP much better than Teamviewer because of how it
works in a local client/server model, with no Internet-based broker server.
When I'm away from home, Teamviewer tends to work better, mostly because I
don't need to open the firewall. As a result, I use both, depending on
where I am.

I used to use a laptop when traveling, and still have one around here
somewhere. These days, I prefer to use my smart phone when traveling.
It's lighter, smaller, and much easier to carry. I primarily it for
Google maps, e-mail, an occasional web search (usually just for weather
forecasts and making restaurant reservations), and Kindle.

When I travel for pleasure rather than work, I do as you do. A smart phone
is good enough for me. We also pack a tablet or Chromebook in case we need
a bigger screen.


I also used to pack a tablet, but now I don't. It's just another bigger,
heavier thing to pack. I've never needed a bigger screen.




--
Ken

On 2020-09-17 9:26 a.m., Ken Blake wrote:
On 9/17/2020 4:10 AM, Frank Slootweg wrote:
Char Jackson wrote:
On Wed, 16 Sep 2020 09:25:13 -0700, Ken Blake
wrote:

On 9/16/2020 9:15 AM, Char Jackson wrote:
[...]

Yep, PS/2, and the cables are really long. They're coiled up like a
telephone cord, (any kids in here may not know that phones used to
have a
cord),
They still do--at least all the ones (five of them) in my house,
except for the cell phones my wife and I have.

Even kids may have parents who who still use land lines.

I haven't had a corded phone since the late 80's, I think. I still
have a
5-phone wireless set, but they are in a drawer and are at risk of going
into the next box for Goodwill.

My house isn't even wired for corded phones. They put TV coax in when
they
built it, and I've added Cat6 Ethernet cable myself, but there are no
phone
lines anywhere.

Â*Â* My house (appartment) isn't wired for corded phones either, but I
still have a (cordless) phone [1], which is connected to the telephone
jack of the modem of my (coax cable) ISP. So you don't have to have
special wiring to still have a 'landline'/'fixed phone'/whatever. Of
course the difference with a *real* old-style 'analog' landline is that
things stop working in case of a power failure.


POTS lines stop working in case of a power failure? Not in my experience.



Check, power failures do not affect pots service, they run on their own
independent power systems.

Rene

Char Jackson wrote:
On Wed, 16 Sep 2020 08:06:13 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:
[...]

[About laptops versus desktops.]

[FWIW, my private PCs from the 80's to early 00's were desktops/towers.]

I travel for work, or at least I did before the current situation arrived,
so I use my laptop for work. It makes sense to me to use it when I'm
working from home, as well, to maintain a sense of continuity. So my laptop
is my work machine,

I started with laptops at/for work. For moving between work-at-home,
work-at-office (both with full docking stations, big monitors,
keyboards, 'mice', etc.) and some work-in-the-field.

Laptops were most convenient, because all your stuff/files went with
the laptop from location to location. Keeping stuff in the cloud was
not yet possible/available, so desktops at home/office and a laptop for
on the road was not feasible, aside from the added expense.

So when I retired, continuing to use a laptop was a no-brainer. (Not
to mention that I could keep the company laptop and all other
work-at-home equipment! :-))

[...]

My wife only uses a laptop at home. She likes to be able to move from the
bedroom to the living room to the breakfast nook to her sewing room, etc.

Being able to move our laptops in and around the house is indeed a big
plus for us. We do not need a big display, so desktops bring us no
advantage and make moving around impossible.

Laptops are more expensive than desktops, harder and more expensive to
repair or upgrade, prone to being dropped and broken, and prone to being
stolen.

If the two most common upgrades are memory and drives, then laptops are
probably easier to upgrade. Usually there's a single screw or other
fastener that allows a door to swing open, allowing direct access to memory
or drives. For other things, like video cards and other expansion cards,
desktops are easier.

Laptops being more expensive than desktops, is a YMMV thing. They
might, they might not, depending on needs. Sometimes and possible even
often, a laptop might actually be cheaper, especially because of the
higher demand for (consumer) laptops than (consumer) desktops.

Theoretically speaking, I indeed had a situation where a memory or/and
disk upgrade or/and display replacement would have been nice and with
the laptop not all of those were (economically) feasible.

Also, within the house I don't think there's an
appreciable risk of theft. In the event of a house fire, in theory we could
grab the laptops on the way out. I hope not to test that theory.

Not that it covers the potential loss of ones recent activities, but I
have offsite and in cloud backup for these scenarios (which also covers
the laptop getting lost/stolen/whatever outside the house).

[...]

I used to use a laptop when traveling, and still have one around here
somewhere. These days, I prefer to use my smart phone when traveling.
It's lighter, smaller, and much easier to carry. I primarily it for
Google maps, e-mail, an occasional web search (usually just for weather
forecasts and making restaurant reservations), and Kindle.

When I travel for pleasure rather than work, I do as you do. A smart phone
is good enough for me. We also pack a tablet or Chromebook in case we need
a bigger screen.

For - extended, often several months (but of course not now :-() -
travel for pleasure, we take all, laptop, tablet and smartphone. We need
the laptop, because during those long periods we might/need access to
our files and cloud-access is too costly or not available at all (i.e.
no mobile coverage, so no Internet).

So all-in-all, OMMV (Our..., generic 'our')) and most likely OMWV! :-)

Ken Blake wrote:
On 9/17/2020 4:10 AM, Frank Slootweg wrote:
Char Jackson wrote:
On Wed, 16 Sep 2020 09:25:13 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:

On 9/16/2020 9:15 AM, Char Jackson wrote:
[...]

Yep, PS/2, and the cables are really long. They're coiled up like a
telephone cord, (any kids in here may not know that phones used to have a
cord),

They still do--at least all the ones (five of them) in my house, except
for the cell phones my wife and I have.

Even kids may have parents who who still use land lines.

I haven't had a corded phone since the late 80's, I think. I still have a
5-phone wireless set, but they are in a drawer and are at risk of going
into the next box for Goodwill.

My house isn't even wired for corded phones. They put TV coax in when they
built it, and I've added Cat6 Ethernet cable myself, but there are no phone
lines anywhere.

My house (appartment) isn't wired for corded phones either, but I
still have a (cordless) phone [1], which is connected to the telephone
jack of the modem of my (coax cable) ISP. So you don't have to have
special wiring to still have a 'landline'/'fixed phone'/whatever. Of
course the difference with a *real* old-style 'analog' landline is that
things stop working in case of a power failure.


POTS lines stop working in case of a power failure? Not in my experience.

My wording was probably not very clear.

I indeed meant that POTS lines continue to work in case of a power
failure, but this/my phone-connected-to-a-cable-modem setup fails in
case of a power failure, because the modem - and most stuff before it
- needs power.

On 9/17/2020 7:51 AM, Frank Slootweg wrote:
Char Jackson wrote:
On Wed, 16 Sep 2020 08:06:13 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:
[...]

[About laptops versus desktops.]

[FWIW, my private PCs from the 80's to early 00's were desktops/towers.]

I travel for work, or at least I did before the current situation arrived,
so I use my laptop for work. It makes sense to me to use it when I'm
working from home, as well, to maintain a sense of continuity. So my laptop
is my work machine,

I started with laptops at/for work. For moving between work-at-home,
work-at-office (both with full docking stations, big monitors,
keyboards, 'mice', etc.) and some work-in-the-field.

Laptops were most convenient, because all your stuff/files went with
the laptop from location to location. Keeping stuff in the cloud was
not yet possible/available, so desktops at home/office and a laptop for
on the road was not feasible, aside from the added expense.

So when I retired, continuing to use a laptop was a no-brainer. (Not
to mention that I could keep the company laptop and all other
work-at-home equipment! :-))


OK. As you know, I disagree, but we're all different.


For - extended, often several months (but of course not now :-() -


I've never been away for longer than four weeks, and that was only once.


travel for pleasure, we take all, laptop, tablet and smartphone. We need
the laptop, because during those long periods we might/need access to
our files and cloud-access is too costly or not available at all (i.e.
no mobile coverage, so no Internet).


I always choose hotels that have free wi-fi service, and I never need
access to any files I have at home.


--
Ken

On 9/17/2020 7:51 AM, Rene Lamontagne wrote:
On 2020-09-17 9:26 a.m., Ken Blake wrote:
On 9/17/2020 4:10 AM, Frank Slootweg wrote:
Char Jackson wrote:
On Wed, 16 Sep 2020 09:25:13 -0700, Ken Blake
wrote:

On 9/16/2020 9:15 AM, Char Jackson wrote:
[...]

Yep, PS/2, and the cables are really long. They're coiled up like a
telephone cord, (any kids in here may not know that phones used to
have a
cord),
They still do--at least all the ones (five of them) in my house,
except for the cell phones my wife and I have.

Even kids may have parents who who still use land lines.

I haven't had a corded phone since the late 80's, I think. I still
have a
5-phone wireless set, but they are in a drawer and are at risk of going
into the next box for Goodwill.

My house isn't even wired for corded phones. They put TV coax in when
they
built it, and I've added Cat6 Ethernet cable myself, but there are no
phone
lines anywhere.

Â*Â* My house (appartment) isn't wired for corded phones either, but I
still have a (cordless) phone [1], which is connected to the telephone
jack of the modem of my (coax cable) ISP. So you don't have to have
special wiring to still have a 'landline'/'fixed phone'/whatever. Of
course the difference with a *real* old-style 'analog' landline is that
things stop working in case of a power failure.


POTS lines stop working in case of a power failure? Not in my experience.



Check, power failures do not affect pots service, they run on their own
independent power systems.


Changing the subject slightly, I once knew a woman who told me she never
used her cell phone during a thunderstorm; she always used her land line
instead. That was because she "knew" that using a cell phone could get
her electrocuted if lightning struck nearby.


--
Ken

On 9/17/2020 8:08 AM, Frank Slootweg wrote:
Ken Blake wrote:
On 9/17/2020 4:10 AM, Frank Slootweg wrote:
Char Jackson wrote:
On Wed, 16 Sep 2020 09:25:13 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:

On 9/16/2020 9:15 AM, Char Jackson wrote:
[...]

Yep, PS/2, and the cables are really long. They're coiled up like a
telephone cord, (any kids in here may not know that phones used to have a
cord),

They still do--at least all the ones (five of them) in my house, except
for the cell phones my wife and I have.

Even kids may have parents who who still use land lines.

I haven't had a corded phone since the late 80's, I think. I still have a
5-phone wireless set, but they are in a drawer and are at risk of going
into the next box for Goodwill.

My house isn't even wired for corded phones. They put TV coax in when they
built it, and I've added Cat6 Ethernet cable myself, but there are no phone
lines anywhere.

My house (appartment) isn't wired for corded phones either, but I
still have a (cordless) phone [1], which is connected to the telephone
jack of the modem of my (coax cable) ISP. So you don't have to have
special wiring to still have a 'landline'/'fixed phone'/whatever. Of
course the difference with a *real* old-style 'analog' landline is that
things stop working in case of a power failure.


POTS lines stop working in case of a power failure? Not in my experience.

My wording was probably not very clear.

I indeed meant that POTS lines continue to work in case of a power
failure, but this/my phone-connected-to-a-cable-modem setup fails in
case of a power failure, because the modem - and most stuff before it
- needs power.


OK, we agree. Thanks for the clarification.


--
Ken

Ken Blake wrote:

Changing the subject slightly, I once knew a woman who told me she never
used her cell phone during a thunderstorm; she always used her land line
instead. That was because she "knew" that using a cell phone could get
her electrocuted if lightning struck nearby.

True if she decided to climb the cell tower while using it...

--
Take care,

Jonathan
-------------------
LITTLE WORKS STUDIO
http://www.LittleWorksStudio.com

Ken Blake wrote:
On 9/17/2020 7:51 AM, Frank Slootweg wrote:
[...]

For - extended, often several months (but of course not now :-() -

I've never been away for longer than four weeks, and that was only once.

travel for pleasure, we take all, laptop, tablet and smartphone. We need
the laptop, because during those long periods we might/need access to
our files and cloud-access is too costly or not available at all (i.e.
no mobile coverage, so no Internet).

I always choose hotels that have free wi-fi service, and I never need
access to any files I have at home.

On those long trips, we travel in a 4WD campervan (small motorhome)
and often stay in 'the bush'/'the outback' (in Australia) for days on
end, i.e. no hotels and no Wi-Fi. Often no mobile coverage for 1000km or
more.

So yes, we're different and hence our needs and wants are different!
:-)

On Thu, 17 Sep 2020 07:15:58 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:

On 9/16/2020 7:43 PM, Char Jackson wrote:
On Wed, 16 Sep 2020 08:06:13 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:

On 9/15/2020 3:34 PM, Char Jackson wrote:
On Tue, 15 Sep 2020 14:43:26 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:

On 9/15/2020 12:38 PM, Frank Slootweg wrote:
Ken Blake wrote:
[...]

I'm different in this respect from almost all the rest of you. If my
keyboard gets old and and dirty, I just toss it out and buy a new one.
They're inexpensive, unless you want a very fancy expensive one; I don't.

I would like to do that too. The problem is that the rest of the
laptop is attached to it! :-)


One of the many disadvantages of using a laptop instead of a desktop.

Why not both? The machine in front of me is primarily a laptop. When I need
to use a desktop, I RDP to it.


Having both is fine if you want to use a desktop at home and a laptop
for traveling. I see no advantage to using a laptop by itself at home,
or using both at home. In fact, to me there's no advantage to having
more than one computer of any kind for use at home.

I travel for work, or at least I did before the current situation arrived,
so I use my laptop for work. It makes sense to me to use it when I'm
working from home, as well, to maintain a sense of continuity.


Yes, I agree. But that's an exception that doesn't apply to most people.


So my laptop
is my work machine, and when I want to do something not related to work,
I'd like to simultaneously use a desktop, so I RDP to it. I view the
desktop full screen on a second monitor.


If it were me, I'd just walk over to wherever the desktop is.

The desktop PC is on the floor, in the otherwise unused space between the
desk and the wall. It has no keyboard or monitor attached. When I'm sitting
at my desk, I'm as close to that PC as I can comfortably get.

snip

My wife only uses a laptop at home. She likes to be able to move from the
bedroom to the living room to the breakfast nook to her sewing room, etc.


It's the same, I guess, for many people who only use laptops, but not
for me. As I said, I think it's a bad mistake for almost everyone.

I think there are solid reasons why desktop PCs make up a small and rapidly
shrinking presence in the consumer space. You can get the same or better
performance with a laptop, but even laptops are being replaced by tablets,
which got replaced by Chromebooks, which got replaced by large-screen
smartphones.

For me, the biggest reason to keep a desktop PC is the capability to put a
large amount of storage in it. USB-attached storage is a non-starter for me
for multiple reasons, and NAS solutions are way too expensive for what they
are. My other reason for having a desktop PC, as a VM host, could be done
by a laptop just as well.

snip

On Thu, 17 Sep 2020 07:24:30 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:

On 9/16/2020 6:42 PM, Char Jackson wrote:
On Wed, 16 Sep 2020 09:25:13 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:

On 9/16/2020 9:15 AM, Char Jackson wrote:
On Wed, 16 Sep 2020 12:59:40 +0100, mechanic wrote:

On Tue, 15 Sep 2020 17:43:20 -0500, Char Jackson wrote:

On Tue, 15 Sep 2020 12:07:25 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:

I just googled ibm m keyboard and found pictures of them. They basically
look the same as modern Windows keyboards, except that they don't have a
Windows key.

A Windows key isn't absolutely necessary, but it's a convenience, and I
wouldn't want a keyboard without one. So lower the price of the IBM to
$11, and I still wouldn't want it. I don't care if it's clickier.

My laptop KB has a Windows key but I don't remember ever using it.

[]

The Win Key is important to me, as past of the sequences eg in
various games, no doubt the bindings could be redefined but a useful
Win Key avoids that hassle. Unfortunately this particular Logitec
keyboard doesn't have a win key so I re-mapped the caps lock key to
Win.

What connection for these fabled IBM dinosaur keyboards, PS/2 ?
Probably not bluetooth. Another cable to add to the clutter.

Yep, PS/2, and the cables are really long. They're coiled up like a
telephone cord, (any kids in here may not know that phones used to have a
cord),


They still do--at least all the ones (five of them) in my house, except
for the cell phones my wife and I have.

Even kids may have parents who who still use land lines.

I haven't had a corded phone since the late 80's, I think. I still have a
5-phone wireless set, but they are in a drawer and are at risk of going
into the next box for Goodwill.

My house isn't even wired for corded phones. They put TV coax in when they
built it, and I've added Cat6 Ethernet cable myself, but there are no phone
lines anywhere.



How old is your house? Is not wiring for corded phones common these
days? I've never heard of it before.

It was built in March 2019. I don't want to guess at what other builders
do, but my builder apparently thinks POTS phones are obsolete. At possible
risk of being pummeled, I have to say that I agree. If I need a pseudo
corded phone, I'll just plug an ATA into an unused Ethernet port and get a
phone jack that way. I have an Obihai in a drawer for that purpose but it's
not currently needed.

On Thu, 17 Sep 2020 07:28:53 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:

On 9/17/2020 7:20 AM, Ken Blake wrote:
On 9/16/2020 7:43 PM, Char Jackson wrote:
On Wed, 16 Sep 2020 08:06:13 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:

On 9/15/2020 3:34 PM, Char Jackson wrote:
On Tue, 15 Sep 2020 14:43:26 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:

On 9/15/2020 12:38 PM, Frank Slootweg wrote:
Ken Blake wrote:
[...]

I'm different in this respect from almost all the rest of you. If my
keyboard gets old and and dirty, I just toss it out and buy a new one.
They're inexpensive, unless you want a very fancy expensive one; I don't.

I would like to do that too. The problem is that the rest of the
laptop is attached to it! :-)


One of the many disadvantages of using a laptop instead of a desktop.

Why not both? The machine in front of me is primarily a laptop. When I need
to use a desktop, I RDP to it.


Having both is fine if you want to use a desktop at home and a laptop
for traveling. I see no advantage to using a laptop by itself at home,
or using both at home. In fact, to me there's no advantage to having
more than one computer of any kind for use at home.

I travel for work, or at least I did before the current situation arrived,
so I use my laptop for work. It makes sense to me to use it when I'm
working from home, as well, to maintain a sense of continuity. So my laptop
is my work machine, and when I want to do something not related to work,
I'd like to simultaneously use a desktop, so I RDP to it. I view the
desktop full screen on a second monitor.

In addition to a laptop and a remote desktop, I also have dozens of virtual
PCs on the desktop, (not all running simultaneously), so I frequently have
multiple virtual Windows PCs running, each doing its own thing. Partly,
this personal use of multiple VMs is a 'because I can' thing, but it's also
extremely handy. It's nice to be able to group tasks together on different
VMs rather than having everything trying to run on a single desktop.

My wife only uses a laptop at home. She likes to be able to move from the
bedroom to the living room to the breakfast nook to her sewing room, etc.

Laptops are more expensive than desktops, harder and more expensive to
repair or upgrade, prone to being dropped and broken, and prone to being
stolen.

If the two most common upgrades are memory and drives, then laptops are
probably easier to upgrade. Usually there's a single screw or other
fastener that allows a door to swing open, allowing direct access to memory
or drives. For other things, like video cards and other expansion cards,
desktops are easier. Also, within the house I don't think there's an
appreciable risk of theft. In the event of a house fire, in theory we could
grab the laptops on the way out. I hope not to test that theory.


In theory, yes. In practice, I'm not so sure. You might need to get out
of the house as quickly as possible.

I also have several fairly valuable instruments.


Sorry, I accidentally omitted a word. That should be "*musical*
instruments."

I knew that, since you've mentioned them before, but others might have
assumed surgical instruments or something even more exotic.

On 9/17/2020 9:51 AM, Jonathan N. Little wrote:
Ken Blake wrote:

Changing the subject slightly, I once knew a woman who told me she never
used her cell phone during a thunderstorm; she always used her land line
instead. That was because she "knew" that using a cell phone could get
her electrocuted if lightning struck nearby.

True if she decided to climb the cell tower while using it...


That might have been her plan. I'm not sure; she didn't tell me.


--
Ken

On 9/17/2020 10:22 AM, Char Jackson wrote:
On Thu, 17 Sep 2020 07:24:30 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:

On 9/16/2020 6:42 PM, Char Jackson wrote:
On Wed, 16 Sep 2020 09:25:13 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:

On 9/16/2020 9:15 AM, Char Jackson wrote:
On Wed, 16 Sep 2020 12:59:40 +0100, mechanic wrote:

On Tue, 15 Sep 2020 17:43:20 -0500, Char Jackson wrote:

On Tue, 15 Sep 2020 12:07:25 -0700, Ken Blake wrote:

I just googled ibm m keyboard and found pictures of them. They basically
look the same as modern Windows keyboards, except that they don't have a
Windows key.

A Windows key isn't absolutely necessary, but it's a convenience, and I
wouldn't want a keyboard without one. So lower the price of the IBM to
$11, and I still wouldn't want it. I don't care if it's clickier.

My laptop KB has a Windows key but I don't remember ever using it.

[]

The Win Key is important to me, as past of the sequences eg in
various games, no doubt the bindings could be redefined but a useful
Win Key avoids that hassle. Unfortunately this particular Logitec
keyboard doesn't have a win key so I re-mapped the caps lock key to
Win.

What connection for these fabled IBM dinosaur keyboards, PS/2 ?
Probably not bluetooth. Another cable to add to the clutter.

Yep, PS/2, and the cables are really long. They're coiled up like a
telephone cord, (any kids in here may not know that phones used to have a
cord),


They still do--at least all the ones (five of them) in my house, except
for the cell phones my wife and I have.

Even kids may have parents who who still use land lines.

I haven't had a corded phone since the late 80's, I think. I still have a
5-phone wireless set, but they are in a drawer and are at risk of going
into the next box for Goodwill.

My house isn't even wired for corded phones. They put TV coax in when they
built it, and I've added Cat6 Ethernet cable myself, but there are no phone
lines anywhere.



How old is your house? Is not wiring for corded phones common these
days? I've never heard of it before.

It was built in March 2019. I don't want to guess at what other builders
do, but my builder apparently thinks POTS phones are obsolete.
At possible
risk of being pummeled, I have to say that I agree.




I don't think they're obsolete yet, but they are getting there. I'd say
"obsolescent" rather than "obsolete." It won't be long now.



If I need a pseudo
corded phone, I'll just plug an ATA into an unused Ethernet port and get a
phone jack that way. I have an Obihai in a drawer for that purpose but it's
not currently needed.



--
Ken