this post was submitted on 08 Sep 2024
609 points (93.4% liked)

Technology

60074 readers
3541 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.


Our Rules


  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related content.
  3. Be excellent to each another!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed

Approved Bots


founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com 379 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (5 children)

Duh. They use phones mostly. A lot of the gen z people I know are just as bad as boomers with tech. Millennials and gen x had that sweet spot of "actually having to learn how shit works not just iphone go brrr."

[–] jballs@sh.itjust.works 225 points 3 months ago (4 children)

Yeah I don't know why the article mentions Gen Z's "tech-savvy reputation". Being able to operate a cell phone doesn't make you tech savvy.

Gen X and Millennials grew up using command line and troubleshooting computer problems before the Internet. Their tech skills are way higher than Gen Z.

[–] cRazi_man@lemm.ee 76 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (4 children)

I never needed to use command line, but I did hone my typing skills on MIRC and ICQ.

[–] Pistcow@lemm.ee 31 points 3 months ago (1 children)

*Mavis Beacon.

Anyone responsible for the family IT services had to learn cmd.

Also, the article reminds me of this

[–] inb4_FoundTheVegan@lemmy.world 6 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I'm thankful my father was so insistent on teaching me to type properly. At the time I was super annoyed at him putting a cardboard cutout over the keyboard so I couldn't see keys. But touch typing has been a boon ever since, I doubt dad was prepping me for typing quickly mid-game but it sure is nice!

[–] Pistcow@lemm.ee 5 points 3 months ago

My dad was similar. Guess thats a good thing looking back. I'm going to teach my kid pivot tables so they can rule the world.

[–] pandapoo@sh.itjust.works 26 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (3 children)

Pretty sure booting into DOS before loading Windows and playing the Oregon Trail on the Apple IIe both count as command line experience.

I also think that as smug as a lot people feel about this, it doesn't seem far off to think that physical keyboard typing skills could be substituted with newer technologies, or refined versions of existing tech. At least in terms of performing most office job functions.

I'm not saying it'll be more efficient, or better, just that it wouldn't be a surprising next step given the trends being discussed here.

If that happens, I have no doubt that smugness will turn into self-righteous indignation and a stubborn refusal to abandon the tactile keyboard for older generations, myself included.

I just hope that if that transition occurs during my lifetime, it's an either-or situation, and not a replacement of the keyboard.

[–] areyouevenreal@lemm.ee 7 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Key chording has always been faster than conventional single letter typing, and that tech has been around for a long time now in the form of stenography machines. Yet most people learn on a conventional keyboard because it's simpler and more ubiquitous. This is true even now that chording has been adapted to programming and similar tasks.

You have to remember we live in a world where most people don't even know how to write properly, even those who do it as part of their job like doctors. If you draw letters by moving your fingers, you're doing it wrong by the way. The actual proper technique involves using your shoulder, elbow, and wrist to do most of the work. We've known about this for centuries, and these techniques were designed with dip pens, quils, brush, and fountain pens in mind. The cheap ballpoint pen along with rather bad instructions from teachers has led to proper handwriting technique being forgotten, and causes problems like RSI in people who handwrite regularly.

[–] barsoap@lemm.ee 7 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (9 children)

Oh ball point pens. Last I heard one of the thing they do preserve in primary school over here is the good ole progression from pencil to fountain pen and sticking for that for the whole four years. Pencil because if you use too much force you break the thing without breaking it, it's just annoying, and that's the point, once they switch to fountain pens they're not going to bend them. Also, cursive from the start. There's important lessons about connecting up letters in there: Writing single letters properly is harder than cursive because on top of moving your pen over the paper, you have to lift it. Much easier if you already have proper on-paper movement down.

I am quite partial to ink rollers nowadays but still can't stand ordinary ball points. They feel wrong.

load more comments (9 replies)
[–] Kadaj21@lemmy.world 4 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Anyone else play Montezuma’s Revenge or that DOS King Kong game throwing explosive bananas after inputting stuff for height, angle, force?

[–] captain_aggravated@sh.itjust.works 5 points 3 months ago (2 children)

You mean that inferior version of Scorched Earth?

[–] frezik@midwest.social 4 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Scorched Earth is the mother of all games. Therefore, all games are inferior to Scorched Earth.

[–] Crismus@lemmy.world 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I remember taking that game home from school with a floppy disk to put on the home pc.

You copied that floppy?!?!

[–] Kadaj21@lemmy.world 1 points 3 months ago

Lol. I just went googling and it was Qbasic Gorrilas! Now that takes me back.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] Kalysta@lemm.ee 11 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I learned mine playing a MUD

You typed fast or you died.

[–] whostosay@lemmy.world 10 points 3 months ago (1 children)

For me it was WoW back when it was more social and you had to communicate via text mid fights and whatnot

[–] subtext@lemmy.world 1 points 3 months ago

Definitely RuneScape that did it for me

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] pineapplelover@lemm.ee 5 points 3 months ago

This is why I feel disconnected from most of my gen z people

[–] noodlejetski@lemm.ee 3 points 3 months ago

Being able to operate a cell phone doesn't make you tech savvy

it does, to a boomer

[–] BombOmOm@lemmy.world 52 points 3 months ago (3 children)

Yep. And phone typing is the 'hunt and peck' method of keyboard typing. Which is unfortunate because it's ingraining the slowest way to type onto a whole generation.

[–] altima_neo@lemmy.zip 12 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, I'm a swiper myself and I can't imagine anyone being able to swipe without knowing the keyboard layout like one would for typing.

[–] snooggums@midwest.social 12 points 3 months ago

A swiping motion and muscle memory for tapping are two different things. It took a while to get fast with my thumbs even though I type fairly fast on a keyboard.

[–] tabular@lemmy.world 7 points 3 months ago (1 children)

There's a mode where you swipe your finger over each letter in order and it auto completes the word. Not sure how often younger people use it (though I wasn't aware you could do that until I saw someone younger doing it).

[–] Zwiebel@feddit.org 8 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Sounds like predictive T9 but slower

[–] chonglibloodsport@lemmy.world 7 points 3 months ago (1 children)

No it’s actually way faster. You can swipe whole words in less than a second. It’s like writing with pen and paper but each letter is actually a whole word.

[–] grysbok@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 3 months ago

Agreed, it's pretty great. And while the computer sometimes misunderstands what you swipe, it will show you potential alternatives you can tap on. Like in this screenshot: example of swipe keyboard showing alternative words

[–] xpinchx@lemmy.world 7 points 3 months ago

T9 was supreme.

[–] mwguy@infosec.pub 8 points 3 months ago

They also stopped teaching typing in schools. My younger family members never had an computer class or a typing class.

[–] Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 3 months ago

Anything beyond ~2002 became worse than the predecessor in IT related tasks.