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It's all the other nonsense that comes along with managing a typical PC that's the problem. System update every so often, upgrade the system every six months, d

It's all the other nonsense that comes along with managing a typical PC that's the problem. System update every so often, upgrade the system every six months, driver problem with graphics, an endless stream of support requests. On the Windows side, its even worse. I shudder every time I see my Mom's Windows install after a gap of a few months - only half the screen is visible in Firefox because of all the malicious toolbars that got installed in the meantime. An iPad would actually be perfect, but its not as affordable(at least for some models). I'm getting the Acer model for my parents when this comes out.

cookiecaper 15y ago
Set up apt-get update && apt-get upgrade -y && apt-get dist-upgrade -y to run as a cronjob, disable the notifications. EDIT: Curious as to why this is getting downvoted. If you don't want to "bothered" with update dialogs, you have to run the updates behind the scenes without prior approval. This is what Chrome already does automatically -- Google pushes an update and you get it no questions asked, so what's wrong with setting up Ubuntu to do it automatically if that's how you want your computer to work? I don't get it. I wasn't suggesting the parents set up the cronjob, just as I didn't suggest that they should install the OS. Competent guy should set that all up, parents can use it without knowing the difference in anything.
- ars 15y ago
  If you're going to do that at least use cron-apt which was made for that. You also need apt-get clean and you are not handling things like conf files changing, and prompts.
cookiecaper 15y ago
And for the record, my 87-year-old grandmother has an iPad and I've had to perform maintenance on it (iOS upgrades that Apple emailed her about, and she was flipping out until she got them, and spent several hours trying to download it herself with her copy of iTunes which is apparently somehow borked because it won't let her update) on multiple occasions, and also show her how to do things on it. Upgrades are not automatic on the iPad.

cookiecaper 15y ago

Set up apt-get update && apt-get upgrade -y && apt-get dist-upgrade -y to run as a cronjob, disable the notifications. EDIT: Curious as to why this is getting downvoted. If you don't want to "bothered" with update dialogs, you have to run the updates behind the scenes without prior approval. This is what Chrome already does automatically -- Google pushes an update and you get it no questions asked, so what's wrong with setting up Ubuntu to do it automatically if that's how you want your computer to work? I don't get it. I wasn't suggesting the parents set up the cronjob, just as I didn't suggest that they should install the OS. Competent guy should set that all up, parents can use it without knowing the difference in anything.

ars 15y ago
If you're going to do that at least use cron-apt which was made for that. You also need apt-get clean and you are not handling things like conf files changing, and prompts.

cookiecaper 15y ago

And for the record, my 87-year-old grandmother has an iPad and I've had to perform maintenance on it (iOS upgrades that Apple emailed her about, and she was flipping out until she got them, and spent several hours trying to download it herself with her copy of iTunes which is apparently somehow borked because it won't let her update) on multiple occasions, and also show her how to do things on it. Upgrades are not automatic on the iPad.