[laptop-accessibility] neophyte with an interest in accessibility for old folks

[Paula Gordon]

Greetings,
I just ordered an XO this evening (G1G1), and started looking around this
site and the support wiki. I'm a layman in terms of computers and
networking, and have no formal education or experience with the disabled. My
informal experience is that I care for my elderly parents and have been
educating myself online about mental decline and physical accessibility
issues and have subsequently done quite a few adaptations in their home.

My big idea for the XO is to give my father access to the Internet. He's 81,
mobility impaired, has decreased manual dexterity and some short-term memory
loss. His cognitive function is still good, though, so I am hoping that he
will be able to operate a laptop that has intuitive controls even if he's
not able to remember how it works. Essentially, he'll have to figure out how
to use it each time, until the knowledge seeps into his long-term memory. He
has been using computers for years, at work and at home since the early
1980s, but he hasn't been able to sit at a desk or follow multistep command
paths for about 10 years.

Is this an area of interest for developers and users here? Using the XO
laptop to improve quality of life for the elderly population? If so, and if
there's anything specific you'd like me to keep track of, please let me
know. I'll be learning how to use the laptop along with him.

Now I'll go back to lurking.
Regards,
Paula

Paula Gordon
Wilmington, DE