Simplified OS for Seniors?

[alurousaac]

Hello, I am hoping to get some help for this. a family member of fine is almost 80 years old, he has used computers for a good over 30 years and currently possesses a windows 10 laptop, which is basically his life, because all he does is listen to music from his Portable Hard Drives and view old pictures. However, it has gotten to a point that he forgets how-to's, so he currently has a lot of copied icons, a lot of duplicate images and songs and it's just all becoming difficult for him.

I am just wondering if there is a program, an OS or anything that he could just open up whenever windows starts or however it works and have simple controls to select multiple songs and less clicks for a person of that age.

Now some may say that some seniors just shouldn't use technology anymore, it could be dangerous. But when that is the only part of their life that is good, taking it away could have consequences.

 

[USAFRet]

There isn't an OS that might prevent new shortcuts or copied files from a user account.

You need a way to reimage the drive every night. Every day, it is exactly like it was yesterday.
For instance, DeepFreeze
http://www.faronics.com/products/deep-freeze/standard

 

[USAFRet]

Or...
Running a Linux OS from a Live USB.
Disable saving anything "new" to the laptop HDD, reboot, and everything is in the same place it was yesterday.

 

[alurousaac]

yes but it's not just that, something simplified that doesn't require so much searching and clicking. I'm not sure how to describe it, but clicking, speed clicking to open stuff, searching specific stuff, have become difficult, for such person.

 

[COLGeek]

Seems like you want a bunch of shortcuts. You also likely want to use a limited account (not admin) to prevent unintended installs/uninstalls.

By the way, as long as your family member has the wherewithal to use tech safely, let them. It keeps the mind more agile and functional. This is a good thing.

 

[USAFRet]

yes but it's not just that, something simplified that doesn't require so much searching and clicking. I'm not sure how to describe it, but clicking, speed clicking to open stuff, searching specific stuff, have become difficult, for such person.

A bunch of shortcuts, directly in the Taskbar.
Music playlists, image folders, etc, etc.

 

[Alabalcho]

Windows 7' MCE would be the solution, but unfortunately is no longer available.

You might want to look around for other media-centric shell (who said "Kodi"), which launches on startup and hides OS behind.