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Tell HN: How an elderly couple I know had their computer 'stop working'
75 points by slowwriter 4 months ago | hide | past | favorite | 93 comments
Thought I'd share a little story from today:

I was on a Zoom call with a few others, and suddenly the husband of this elderly couple proclaims that their computer 'stopped working'.

There was, however, some evidence to suggest the contrary as they were still in the call with us.

After a while we realize what has gone wrong: The husband accidentally disabled Bluetooth. The keyboard and mouse were both connected via Bluetooth.

Was it a laptop, so he could use the built-in trackpad temporarily to enable Bluetooth? Nope.

Did they have a USB mouse around to use? Also no.

So now they literally have to go into town to get a USB mouse. We had a good laugh about that.

But it did make me wonder: The button to disable Bluetooth is easily accessibly in macOS on this iMac, and honestly this could have happened to anyone including myself.

So why doesn't macOS warn the user before you disconnect all your peripherals?




> So why doesn't macOS warn the user before you disconnect all your peripherals?

What version of MacOS and what specific Mac and what Bluetooth mouse and keyboard?

On my 2017 iMac running 13 (Ventura) which has a Bluetooth keyboard but a USB mouse trying to turn of Bluetooth brings up a dialog that asks if I'm sure and warns me that if I turn it off I won't be able to control the Mac with a Bluetooth mouse, keyboard, or trackpad, and gives me options to cancel or proceed to turn off Bluetooth.

On my 2023 Mac Studio running 14.2.1 (Sonoma) on which both the keyboard and mouse are Bluetooth it gives me a dialog that says in bold "You cannot control your computer if you turn Bluetooth off at this time", and below that in non-bold repeats that with "as you would lose your input devices" added.

It only has an "OK" button which dismisses the dialog, leaving Bluetooth enabled.

The Bluetooth keyboards on both of those are Apple Magic Keyboards, and the Bluetooth mouse on the Mac Studio is an Apple Magic Mouse. I wonder if the warnings only happen if you are using at least one Apple input device?


I will have to ask them for specifics, but I believe they are on an older iMac (pre 2017) that cannot run Ventura or newer. If they are running Ventura, they may have simply overlooked the dialog completely, but I'm leaning more towards a version of macOS that didn't have the dialog.


Great question. Something like, "This computer has no input devices. Check your keyboard and mouse." Seems like pretty important use case for a personal computer targeting people who may not have grown up around computers or even finished high school.

As a user of personal computers, I should be able to easily determine if my computer is configured for basic use.


That error message is very poor.

Check your keyboard and mouse? I don't even know what you mean by that.

This computer has no input devices? Well that is simply false. The user is currently using an input device when they see this message.

Here's a better message:

"Warning!

Disabling Bluetooth will disconnect your wireless keyboard and wireless mouse. You will need to use a wired keyboard and wired mouse to re-enable Bluetooth.

Are you sure you want to disable Bluetooth?

Cancel. Disable Bluetooth. "

There should probably be a hardware button or switch to enable Bluetooth.


And, sadly, given the rate of "click through" on all warning dialogs, a very many users will not read even the "better message" and will simply reflexively hit the "ok" button to "make this popup go away", effectively ending up in the same state.

Better is either the button/switch to turn Bluetooth on, or do not allow disablement when either a mouse or a keyboard is connected via Bluetooth and no wired version of the same is presently installed.


> Better is either the button/switch to turn Bluetooth on, or do not allow disablement when either a mouse or a keyboard is connected via Bluetooth and no wired version of the same is presently installed.

I was thinking similarly, but for backwards compatibility, maybe only allow a person to disable it using a somewhat complicated combination of hotkeys. Show the warning and then after 5 seconds the hotkeys would be displayed and active. Or maybe something similar to "sticky keys" on Windows, when you hold down shift for a bit.


Never use the word "Cancel" in a warning dialog.

It is easy to get confused. Cancel what? Cancel Bluetooth? Cancel the turning off of Bluetooth?

Better are two buttons like this: [Keep Bluetooth running] [Disable Bluetooth].

Mac OS does this often right. I say this somewhat grudgingly.


You also need a “I don’t know what to do” button. Clicking this will do the most sensible thing which in this case is keeping Bluetooth running. Because my elderly mother is 100% disabling bluetooth under that situation using logic I can’t even comprehend.


Cancel maybe better than that because the confused user doesn't know what the current state of the system is. Cancel means "don't do anything". "Keep" implies the same thing, but I think cancel would confuse less grandparents.


The problem with either message is that it requires enough context to predict that the future state will make the computer unusable. (I know there are no HID usb devices, I know there is a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse).

Neither message is particularly bad, but hypothetical error messages are just that. Either message would require piercing the veil between the Bluetooth transceiver and the devices that rely on it, meaning you’d have to be careful to avoid a leaky abstraction. (Bunch of HID detection spaghetti next to your clean Bluetooth disabling code).

Agree about the switch.


> Check your keyboard and mouse

Check engine light? I checked! The engine is still there!


> The user is currently using an input device when they see this message.

Surely they are using an output device, the screen?


They need to use an input device like a mouse to disable bluetooth. Which they are about to not be able to use. But when they are seeing the message they are still using it.


The first thing anyone is taught is the names of things, I don't think it's a stretch to expect people to know what the name of the thing they type on and the name of the pointing device they use is called.


That's needlessly verbose already. If you just warn people that disabling Bluetooth will disable their keyboard and mouse, they will put A and B together and cancel. No need to turn it into a logical exercise.


Reminds me of the classic BIOS error message:

"Keyboard not found. Press F1 to continue"


I have done exactly this on an iMac. Thankfully a wired mouse was in the same building. But I was shocked, reflecting on how easily I had suddenly made my computer almost totally inoperable, by accident, without a warning.


This is the 2020s equivalent of setting the display resolution beyond what your monitor could handle back in the Win2k days. Back then it did not revert the settings back after 20 seconds!


Yet, things could be worse. Back in the 80s & 90s it was possible to select a resolution/refresh frequency that would permanently damage (e.g. destroy) a CRT (cathode ray tube) monitor.


That reminds me of setting unsupported display resolution back in the mid 90s on Windows 95, resulted in blank screen. Luckily my brother and I knew the UI by heart, rebooted the machine -> opened "Start" menu -> Settings -> Control Panel -> Display -> Move to Settings tab -> Change to working resolution -> Apply -> Reboot - all on the blank screen using keyboard, it worked though!


I've never liked using bluetooth peripherals and this gives me another reason. USB dongle for life, I guess.


Wait, are you saying you just trade the wireless functionality from the built in Bluetooth to an external Bluetooth dongle?


The dongle is definitely not using Bluetooth. Wireless peripherals with USB dongles generally have their own custom radio protocol, for better or worse.


Before later revisions of Bluetooth with ultra-low-power modes, a mouse using Bluetooth was considerably more power-hungry than dedicated radio interfaces -- short battery life.


I had one of those, a Logitech MX1000.

It needed to charge multiple times per week in a cradle and always indicated the battery life when it was moved around.

It would die in the middle of playing DotA, so I had two and would pause the game with the admin commands on my host bot for just long enough to pull the waiting one out of the dock and press the pairing buttons. Fun times lol.


Usually it's for better


A physical OEM USB dongle on PC side, whether Bluetooth or not, and an On/Off switch on the peripheral side would have certainly prevented the issue in discussion.


Surely if you disable bluetooth in the OS it'll disable any bluetooth dongles as well?


Usually from computer’s point of view these devices look like regular USB mice or keyboards so disabling Bluetooth will not disable them.


Proprietary wireless dongles for keyboards and mice are often not Bluetooth.


Surely they charge the keyboard and mouse. Wouldn't at least one of them be charged via a USB cable? Plugging that to the computer would turn the peripheral into a wired USB one.


Ever tried using an Apple mouse while charging? ;)

Jokes aside, not all bluetooth devices turn wired once plugged in. I know my MX Keys USB-C port is only for charging, for example.


A keyboard is sufficient to turn Bluetooth on:

• Hit ⌘-space to open Spotlight.

• Type enough of "bluetooth file exchange" to find the Bluetooth File Exchange app and launch it.

• Bluetooth File Exchange will see that Bluetooth is off and give you a dialog offering to turn it on, with turning it on the default action, so just hit return and Bluetooth will get turned on.


Given very careful instruction this might have worked. But I didn’t know this trick myself to begin with. Now I do!


How do you hit cmd-space when your keyboard is disconnected?


This branch of the thread is about the case where your Bluetooth devices charge by USB, and so you grab your charging cable and connect them to your computer. It was pointed out that Apple's Bluetooth mouse does not work over USB even though it does charge over USB.

My point is that you do not need to get your mouse connected in order to turn on Bluetooth. You just need to get one of {keyboard, mouse, trackpad} connected.


>"No grandpa, hit the one that looks like it has a pretzel on it"


Or "the key that has the word 'command' printed on it" or "the key one left of the space bar" or "the key one right of the space bar".

Or, if their Mac supports "Hey Siri" and it is enabled, "Hey Siri, Open Bluetooth File Exchange".


Or, you know... just show them in the camera since they're still on Zoom.


> Ever tried using an Apple mouse while charging? ;)

Lol yeah that design is really baffling!

That said, it's still possible. The charging port is near the back edge of the mouse (the side closer to the user) whereas the sensor is on the other end. It won't be comfortable but letting the cable hang off the edge of the desk should allow you to use it to turn bluetooth back on. :)


It's not that baffling. It let them keep the exact same form factor as the previous non-rechargeable Magic Mouse, and the mouse can go long enough between charges and charges so fast that they knew in practice 99.99% of Mac users would not have a problem with it.

It charges to full in a couple hours and lasts at least a month on a full charge so almost everyone has plenty of opportunities to charge it at times when they aren't using the computer.

If you do let it get low enough that it might die it only takes a couple minutes of charging to get enough charge to last 8 hours. Start charging and go get a drink of water or visit the bathroom and when you get back it is ready for the rest of the work day.

That said, from what I've read there either is no warning when power gets low or it doesn't always work. With it only needing charging every month or so I can someone forgetting. It is possible to make a script to check it and give an alert if it is low, and make a cron job run that script [1]. That really should be built in.

[1] https://dev.to/samselfridge/magic-mouse-low-battery-alert-4m...


> and lasts at least a month on a full charge

Which is very short compared to other mice: Logitech's (and mostly everybody else's, I assume) Bluetooth mice last for several months, some last for years on a single charge. I suppose it's not a fair comparison in that the Apple mouse does more? But they still suck in terms of runtime.


lol, this is such a victim-blaming answer, the design is bananas there's no excuse for it. Changing the form-factor slightly is worth it so you can plug the damn thing in while charging.


It can't be victim-blaming because there are no victims. 99.99% of people who have those mice will never find themselves in a situation where not being able to charge while using affects them.

The 0.01% who manage to find themselves with an empty battery will be slightly inconvenienced for two minutes while they charge it up enough to get to the end of their day.


Yeah, and as it happened this was an iMac with a Magic Mouse, so plugging it in was also not an option.


I was under the impression that the Apple keyboards could work via the lightning cable. Could be an old battery one though


They do, but instructing them to enable Bluetooth using only the keyboard didn’t seem feasible to me.


They do.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39027263


Plenty of cheap peripherals still run on disposable batteries.


Externally rechargable AAs are great. I don't have to have specific charging stations for everything, and when a battery does wear out, it's easy to replace.

I haven't been super happy with the rechargable AAAs I've used, so I might prefer specific batteries for smaller items. But most video game controllers or presentation remotes or wireless keyboard and mouse have plenty of room for one or two AAs


"cheap" peripherals like the $180 xbox elite controller... grumble grumble...


User replaceable batteries could be sold as a feature these days. Would people be pissed to see them just being double or triple-A?


If they had Apple input devices (Magic Keyboard, touchpad, etc) they don't work over the wire.


It absolutely does work over the wire. I've done it, and a quick Googling shows plenty of others getting it to work. (Example: https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/246337/apple-magic...)


Correct. When I first converted an old, out-of-support Mac to Linux, I used its equally old Magic Keyboard, connected by Lightning-to-Lightning cable, since I often needed to make entries when `bluez` and other associated Bluetooth s/w weren’t yet running. (Have since replaced it with a regular wired keyboard.)


It definitely does - that’s even how you can most easily first pair them since plugging it in will automatically pair the Bluetooth device.


Is that so? I have a Magic Trackpad with a Lightning connection and I was under the impression that it did work over the cable. Thinking about it though, I'm not sure I ever validated that.


I’m pretty sure macOS does warn you that turning Bluetooth off will disconnect your keyboard/mouse/trackpad, if thats the only input device you’ve got connected.

Not sure when it was introduced but it’s definitely there on the latest version because I bumped into it the other day.


Interesting! If that’s the case, great! But I believe the couple in question is on an older iMac not upgradeable to the latest version of macOS, so they would still be out of luck.


Never thought of this but this sounds like the kind of thing that would happen to me right before an important meeting.


This website claims turning the computer off and on will prompt macOS to search for Bluetooth keyboard/mouse if there isn’t one connected.

https://macreports.com/how-to-turn-on-bluetooth-on-your-mac-...

I don’t understand how one is supposed to do this without a keyboard or mice though:

> If you are working on documents, save them, and close them.


Someone else pointed this out, I didn’t know. Although, yes, if they needed to close any prompts that might have been a problem.


My wife has a similar problem with the iMac supplied wireless mouse. She'll go to click-drag something and catch the power switch, which is on the underside of the mouse, on the mousepad turning off the mouse. This has happened maybe four times in the two years we've had it, but everytime it's been "The computer crashed!" and gets power-cycled, losing work. Of course it's still "crashed" when it comes back up because the mouse is turned off. This post makes me feel like I should put a sticky note on there to check the mouse next time.


I chuckled reading this… would restarting the Mac re-enable the Bluetooth?


:)

Well, add that to the list of things that didn't prevent or solve the problem, unfortunately.

Also, I was thinking: If I was in that situation I might SSH into it from a different machine. Yeah, good luck with that to the elderly couple.


You have to enable remote SSH in the settings, first.


And actually have a second computer -- "elderly couple" quite highly implies that this computer is likely the only one they have.


For sure. I did say ‘if it had happened to me’, though. And I do happen to have SSH enabled on both of my machines.


Perhaps. IIRC, if a Mac starts and no keyboard is attached or paired it will show a Bluetooth searching dialog box


Interesting. Didn’t know, will have to check that.


Yes.

One of the things I absolutely fucking loathe on my MacBook is it will always turn on the Bluetooth upon hard (re)boot. I never use Bluetooth; I turn it off for a reason.

It literally does not matter what I tell the operating system to do: The tooth must blue, for that is the One Apple Way(tm).


Although that sounds annoying, clearly the reason for that behavior is this entire thread. If the old couple had not been zooming at the time, they would have rebooted and that would have fixed things.


If I had known that rebooting would re-enable Bluetooth, that would’ve been a good fix in this particular situation. Although I do see how it can be annoying under normal circumstances.


Reminds me: After moving, my PC (desktop) and mouse where available, but the keyboard still in one of many unopened boxes. Had to quickly check something, should be doable with mouse only. Only to be greeted by the BIOS message: "Keyboard error or no keyboard present, press F9 to continue".


> So now they literally have to go into town to get a USB mouse. We had a good laugh about that.

They just need to turn it off at the wall and turn it back on again, I believe - it will look for keyboard and mouse


Hah! Fun times. A prompt for 'N devices are paired, are you sure?' is a good idea

If their car is like mine, plug the laptop in there.

For some reason, plugging my phone in for Android Auto also forces my Bluetooth on.


If the keyboard is an Apple Keyboard (likely because it's an iMac) connecting it to the computer via the included charging cable will associate it with the computer. I'm not certain, but I'm willing to guess plugging in either the keyboard or the mouse will reenable bluetooth so the peripherals can be used (the mouse cannot be used while plugged in as I recall the design doesn't allow it.)


A remote access tool with a client pre-configured could fix this. E.g., if this happened to me, I'd use KDE Connect since I already have it paired.


You still need another device to remote in. Odds are you could just zoom from that device


...zoom or another meeting system would require the other side to accept the connection. Using...what? OTOH, low-level remote access usually lacks any UI (such as the mentioned KDE Connect's Remote input, which mimics another input device).

But again, this requires some planning beforehand. Even "ssh in, install a remote viewer and use that" would require SSH to be there and reachable from outside (as NAT is likely). In the end, this is no different from "just grab the wired mouse and plug it in. Which one? Well the one you prepared beforehand."


One lesson is that wired devices are better when they are practical. Less to go wrong - no dependence on something that might get turned off, no batteries going flat. You even get a smaller attack surface.


Exactly the reason why I am rocking a Broadcast Headset (Beyerdynamic DT-797PV, to be specific) for work calls. It has XLR for the microphone and 1/4" for the headphones. All goes into a cheap Behringer UMC22. Never had any problems with Teams, Zoom, ... you name it, my colleagues using bluetooth have constant issues, be it with connectivity, audio quality or both.

Also since I wear glasses all day everyday I will never use any headphones that don't have velours earpads. So much more comfortable than faux leather.


Could work same as video settings since ever. You have several seconds to confirm your screen still works and if you don't confirm, the settings automatically revert.


I always use a wired keyboard/mouse. Less to go wrong.


Would connecting a phone via USB work? Is there an app that lets you use your phone as a mouse / keyboard via USB?


The USB port on phones is kinda locked down, and without rooting your phone I don't think there is any API to emulate an arbitrary device like a keyboard/mouse.


KDE Connect has a feature to use the phone as peripheral keyboard/mouse IIRC.


Surely, this computer must have come with a non-BT keyboard and/or mouse, though?


An iMac comes with all wireless peripherals, but the charging cables for the devices can be used for using them wired in this situation.


Not the Magic Mouse, though, unless you’re very skilled with your fingers.


Maybe it did but they didn’t keep it?


I had a similar problem with my Windows gaming PC after I upgraded CPU cooler. Motherboard/BIOS decided that I've upgraded my CPU and it would not proceed without me pressing "F2" key on my keyboard.

Obviously my BT keyboard did not yet connect to the computer, since it was before BT drivers loaded or something, so I had to buy a wired keyboard to press "F2" and proceed. Would be nice to have 2-3 buttons right on a case to interact with BIOS. Or you know…load BT drivers.


I think some BIOS's do have support for bluetooth keyboards. There is a crazy thing where windows will send the bios the necessary encryption keys, so while the BIOS cannot pair with a keyboard, it can use a previously paired one.

Doubt it works with linux, and I bet it depends on using the exact right config even on windows.




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