Portable Computers « Vincent Gable’s Blog

February 23, 2009

Laptop Mats

Filed under: Announcement,Design,Usability | Mobility, Portable Computers, Steal My Ideas Please
― Vincent Gable on February 23, 2009

I just really want somebody to make a good portable cooling pad for portable computers.

Laptops¹ are too hot to be used on a lap. This Penny Arcade comic says it best, if a little crudely,

Using this Macbook is like putting my dick in a George Foreman Grill. Okay? It’s like making a penis panini.

There’s a real need for something to keep your your lap cool. You can buy gel cooling pads. But I have reservations about them. The biggest is the weight of the gel. And according to reviews, eventually the pad absorbs enough heat to turn into a hot pad.

My solution is inspired by sushi mats:

It’s a very simple idea really, instead of bamboo slats, you use hollow aluminum tubes in the mat. That gives you an extremely light pad that’s easy to roll up and carry anywhere. It keeps the hot computer off your lap, draws heat away from the computer. (Aluminum has been used to make heat sinks for decades.)

Oh, and just in case you were wondering I’m using a book to protect my lap as I write this. But books are heavy, so I only carry one if I need to refer to the book.

If you have a better way to stay cool while working on the road, please share!

¹
I’m counting netbooks (inexpensive, ultraportable but slow computers) as separate from “laptops”. Certainly many netbooks work just fine on top of the lap. But some people will always need more powerful laptops.

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November 6, 2008

Alan Kay on Why Computer-Based Teaching Fails

Filed under: Accessibility,Quotes | Alan Kay, AlphaSmart, Doing With Images Makes Symbols, Dysgraphia, Education, Portable Computers
― Vincent Gable on November 6, 2008

Here’s a lightly-edited transcription of Alan Kay, explaining why computer-aided instruction so often fails (from “Doing with Images makes Symbols”, 1987),

After the experience I’ve had with working with both children and adults with computers (and at least dabbling in the areas of learning and education), I think that one of the best ways of thinking of a computer is very similar to thinking of what a piano means when teaching music.

The piano can amplify musical impulse. We can only sing with one voice. If we want to play a four-part fugue, we have to use something mechanical, like a piano to do it. And it can be done very beautifully.

But for most people the piano has been the biggest thing that turns millions of people away from music for the rest of their lives. And I think the best way to sum it up is just to say that all musicians know that the music is not inside the piano…

So, in any situation where education and learning is involved, you first have to develop a curriculum based on ideas, not on media. Media can be an amplifier of those ideas, but you have to have the ideas first.

And I think the reason computers have failed is that almost everybody, no matter which way they have tried to use computers, have wanted the computer to to be some sort of magic ointment over the suppurating wound of bad concepts. … But first you have to have the ideas.

This was exactly my experience as a student. I am dysgraphic — I have trouble writing legibly by hand, and spelling. So I took a laptop to all my classes, from 8th grade (1997) through college. The laptop solved a particular problem for me. But outside of that, it did not enhance my education; in some cases it got in the way. (One professor found students using laptops the most during class did 11% worse on tests compared to the rest of the class). If I wasn’t dysgraphic, I would have been better-off with a Moleskine.

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