Waay back in the day I was using crusty old shared Sun3 workstations. The keyboard was really sticky because, well, some students are pigs. I developed the habit of SLAMMING the Enter key on each command, until one day I was deleting backup files (rm *~) and my fingers grazed the delete button before striking Enter...
> The keyboard was really sticky because, well, some students are pigs.
I work at a technological youth centre, teaching kids cool things to do with computers, programming, music and whatnot. All the hardware we get is donated from businesses, schools, etc. (because volunteers / zero-budget).
And this is just ... ahh. I usually cope by trying not to notice and focus on the screen instead. Sometimes though the ick overwhelms and I fail, curse and go on a hunt for a slightly less gross keyboard. And wash my hands after--though I kind of wonder if that even really makes a difference in this particular scenario (except for the idea of it), afaik the main benefit of washing your hands (in these situations, not if you're a surgeon or a cook etc) is some kind of herd-immunity deal isn't it? And given the keyboards stay dirty, and the kids continue to work on them hands-to-keyboard-to-nose-to-mouse-to-mouth-to-keyboard-to-everything-repeat (esp. the younger ones).
You know what would be really nice? Dishwasher-safe keyboards.
And yeah (before anyone replies with a link), I'm sure those exist already. Except that many of the places that need them don't budget for new (or specialty) keyboards but rely on donated used ones. But it would be really nice to have :) :)
The solution implemented roughly a year into my position was to liberally spread cans of wet-cleaning-wipes. It was such as obvious solution and it helped tremendously.
Alternative keyboards weren't an option in those Sun 3 days, but I've brought my own chair, keyboard, and mouse to work for decades now.
