PC sales Suffer Biggest Slump in years

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by tompe

Maybe you forgot to move the Ctrl key to its proper place (the CAPS Lock position on modern keyboards).

I was using a Sun workstation with a Sun keyboard. No remapping needed.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by j.p.s

I was using a Sun workstation with a Sun keyboard. No remapping needed.

That much have been a very old Sun keyboard. All images I find of US SUN keyboards have CAPS-lock were Ctrl should be (to the left of A).

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by tompe

That much have been a very old Sun keyboard. All images I find of US SUN keyboards have CAPS-lock were Ctrl should be (to the left of A).

It wasn't an old keyboard at the time I was struggling to learn emacs. I don't use Suns much any more, so each time I do, it is a shock to see the Ctrl key in the wrong place, and those awful wheel mice.

[HarryT]

Has the "Ctrl" key moved on US keyboards? On UK keyboards it's always been bottom row, left side, as far as I can recall.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Has the "Ctrl" key moved on US keyboards? On UK keyboards it's always been bottom row, left side, as far as I can recall.

No, not on old Sun keyboards and on VT100 terminals. It changed for Sun keyboard when they started to use the PC keyboard layout. It was very annoying.

[jbjb]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Has the "Ctrl" key moved on US keyboards? On UK keyboards it's always been bottom row, left side, as far as I can recall.

That's true for PC keyboards as far as I remember, but even in the UK, serial terminals (VT100 etc) and many non-PC workstations had the Ctrl key where caps lock is now.

Remapping the Caps-Lock Key to Ctrl is quite common for vi/vim users on keyboards that have Caps-Lock on the home row - it not only makes Ctrl more accessible, but also reduces the carnage caused by rapidly typing a string of normal-mode commands with Caps-Lock accidentally engaged.

Many vi(m) users remap Caps-Lock to Esc - however, I prefer mapping it to Ctrl as the "Ctrl+[" equivalent for Esc is then easy to reach.

/JB

[SeaKing]

Originally Posted by HansTWN

With my new PC tablet I can wake it up from sleep instantly and it can stay in sleep mode for many days without losing a significant amount of battery charge. Even with Wifi on and e-mail downloads active.

You can, of course, keep any old computer always plugged in, running, and then use it immediately --- but that wasn't progress.

So, "grasshopper" you are saying that

a tablet on battery in sleep mode

........is different from

a computer plugged in with a screen saver.

Remember, I said essentially, "Of course if only a battery is powering the equipment, there are problems with that idea,."

Your "progress" is only in effect and visible beyond the reach of the power cord.

Originally Posted by SeaKing

Your "progress" is only in effect and visible beyond the reach of the power cord.

A lot of us spend at least part of the day out of the reach of the power cord, so those low power modes are important. It also makes the use of electronics less psychologically demanding for some people. As an example: they can "turn it off" without interrupting a download.

[HansTWN]

Originally Posted by BWinmill

A lot of us spend at least part of the day out of the reach of the power cord, so those low power modes are important. It also makes the use of electronics less psychologically demanding for some people. As an example: they can "turn it off" without interrupting a download.

Even if an outlet is within reach it can be a pain always being tied to the cord. On the sofa, in bed, at the airport, etc. Long battery life means freedom for me and was the main deciding factor when I just purchased my latest laptop.

[forsooth]

Originally Posted by BWinmill

--------

It also makes the use of electronics less psychologically demanding for some people. As an example: they can "turn it off" without interrupting a download.

explain please.

Originally Posted by forsooth

explain please.

Ever notice how computers have a lot of options, like: reboot, sleep, hibernate, turn-off? A lot of people don't know or care about the difference between those commands, while they interrupt stuff that the computer may be doing in the background (like downloads or polling for new messages). Most mobile devices can go into a low power mode that will continue with those background activities with the press of a button, which is why I stuck "turn it off" in quotes. Of course you can actually turn most of those devices off if you tried, but I'd suggest that most people never even bother.

[frahse]

Originally Posted by BWinmill

Ever notice how computers have a lot of options, like: reboot, sleep, hibernate, turn-off? A lot of people don't know or care about the difference between those commands, while they interrupt stuff that the computer may be doing in the background (like downloads or polling for new messages). Most mobile devices can go into a low power mode that will continue with those background activities with the press of a button, which is why I stuck "turn it off" in quotes. Of course you can actually turn most of those devices off if you tried, but I'd suggest that most people never even bother.

"most people never even bother" is correct.
Recently I was called to fiddle with my wife's home Toshiba laptop which has a Toshiba "ECO cloak" laid on top of it.
She had a lot of stuff running all the time, screen saver, slide shows of all sorts of things, etc.
Occasionally the machine just wouldn't "come back" from wherever it had warped off to, and she not being of a hardware type bent didn't understand that "press the off button" means these days that you hold the thing down for a while until it makes a funny "off" sound. Then you could bring it back up -- usually.
(Darn, where is the E-Stop when you need it?)

Anyway, I am looking at the screen, and press the screen virtual "Start" button and what? "No hibernate?" "No shutdown," "No Power off." Had to work to restore hibernate even.

It works better, but I still had to give a "finger on" lesson on how to press the physical power off/on button until you get that "funny off sound."

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by tompe

One annoying thing is that I have lost the middle button on my Dell XPS13 Ubuntu Edition. I cannot find how to get it to work in a reasonable way with the touchapd so I have to use Ctrl-C and Ctrl-V instead. Very irritating.

Try tapping in the upper right corner of the touchpad. That is the third rated answer on this page at askubuntu.com
http://askubuntu.com/questions/13039...d-middle-click
I just tried it on a Dell XPS 13 Developer Edition (factory installed ubuntu 12.04, the one released this spring with core i7 and 1920x1080 screen) and it worked fine.

When I found the above link, I implemented the second ranked answer (editing 50-synaptics.conf to make a 3 finger tap middle click). I then changed it to make 2 finger tap middle click and three finger tap right click.

I didn't try the top rated answer.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by j.p.s

Try tapping in the upper right corner of the touchpad. That is the third rated answer on this page at askubuntu.com
http://askubuntu.com/questions/13039...d-middle-click
I just tried it on a Dell XPS 13 Developer Edition (factory installed ubuntu 12.04, the one released this spring with core i7 and 1920x1080 screen) and it worked fine.

When I found the above link, I implemented the second ranked answer (editing 50-synaptics.conf to make a 3 finger tap middle click). I then changed it to make 2 finger tap middle click and three finger tap right click.

I didn't try the top rated answer.

I wonder how I missed that when googling.

But I have disabled single finger taps since they were annoying since it was so easy to tap by mistake. And clicking in the right hand top corner does not work.

I will try the other suggestions. Thanks for the info.