[Coco] The early days of Hacking and Coding a CoCo Was: Here's a CoCo 1 ...

[Aaron Wolfe]

On Jan 20, 2014 9:25 PM, "Allen Huffman" <alsplace at pobox.com> wrote:

> > online documentation while working on a remote linux box via SSH.  On
> > a tablet you can never see all three at the same time!
>
> I can see how that would be a problem. But the resolution of my tablet is
higher than the resolution of my laptop, so I can't really complain about
lack of screen real estate. (Screen is smaller, though, since I have a
larger laptop than I used to have.)
>

High resolution is nice, and can be very pretty.  I'd trade it in an
instant for multiple windows/views when I need to actually get anything
done.  DPI doesn't help me use SSH, type documents, write code, or really
much of anything productive.

>
> True, true... But I wonder: how many pictures do folks take with their
digital camera, versus their phones? It doesn't matter how great the device
is if you never have it with you. I think if I had an Ultrabook, which
would still be twice as bulky, I might "almost" see myself carrying
something like that around.
>

Personally I find carrying even a 7 inch tablet to be inconvenient.  If
you've given up the "fits in my pocket" factor, I can't see much difference
between carrying a bag with a tablet and keyboard and mouse inside it vs a
bag with a small laptop inside it.  If you have to carry a bag, its a fail
(for me :).  And if I have to carry a bag, you can be sure it's going to
contain as much computing power as I can fit in that bag, which again means
not a tablet.

> > Cringley's vision of the future may be spot on, but today's tech isn't
> > delivering that experience.
>
> That sounds like a software issue then, more than a hardware issue. We
use three netbook computers (Atom processors) to run three attractions in
Haunted Houses, and those things are so slow and limited compared to a
modern tablet, but they are enough to do the job. Unforunately, their
screen is so tiny and the keyboards are crap, it's harder to type on them
than an iPad and bluetooth keyboard.

Could you not use the same Bluetooth keyboard with the netbook that you use
with the iPad?  Considering that the three netbooks together probably cost
about the same as one ipad you're still probably ahead (and that's ignoring
that the software you need to run the haunted house probably doesn't run on
the ipad).

> The times they are a changing, and us "old folks" (welcome to the club)
are going to be holding on to our quaint keyboards and "mice" while a new
generation is coming up wondering why we touch things to use them :)

Things are certainly changing.. they always have been since I first met my
first CoCo.  Where I think we disagree is whether the tablet phase is going
to be some sort of long lived plateau.   In my opinion, they are just too
limited to be a big deal.
They are worse than what we already had prior in terms of productivity, so
it's only a matter of time until something delivers their benefits without
the step backwards.