Should I teach my kids Dvorak or QWERTY? English or metric?

[sparkeyjames]

QWERTY as I rarely see a Dvorak keyboard. Qwerty is much more common and pretty much the defacto standard.Teach them both of the measurement systems. Start by teaching what each one is it's history uses etc. and then how to convert between the two.
I can never remember the darn conversion formula and always wind up using either an online conversion utility or getting out my old linux based PDA and using the one I got for it. Working in the printing business as I do I rarely see metric sized anything except the wrenches used for fixing a piece of equipment. All paper sizes in the US for office and advertising are still in the old standard units of measure ie Letterhead 8.5"x11" and a Business card 2"x3.5"

[LinuxRandal]

I can never remember the darn conversion formula and always wind up using either an online conversion utility or getting out my old linux based PDA and using the one I got for it.

Your not the only one. People who send satellites to Mars, also don't always remember the conversions.

As for cars, learn to read the bolt heads, as there are still a lot of old enough cars, where the engine is metric, and the body is SAE.

[Tom Slick]

I think more importantly is getting her hooked on linux and writing java. maybe take away the GUI so she knows nothing but code until she is old enough to find out there is a difference

[jking]

Another vote for Qwerty.

As for Metric vs. Imperial measures, chances are pretty good that they will need to know both to some degree. The science classes at schools probably lean toward metric (it's better for chemistry), but, make sure they understand Imperial measures. They are both common in the real world & I have seen no signs of Imperial measures being replaced.

Funny note on metric. One of it's big benefits is the simplicity of converting as everything is based in 10's. We had a customer specifically ask us to change the dimensions on our drawings from mm to cm because their people couldn't do the conversion.

[BobSch]

... We had a customer specifically ask us to change the dimensions on our drawings from mm to cm because their people couldn't do the conversion.

If I had employees who couldn't move a decimal point one digit to the left, I think I'd start looking for a good bankruptcy attorney.

[Alex Franke]

Great input. I think QWERTY it is. We'll probably start using both metric and English measurements, or maybe change between the two.

Also, you really should nail down whether they are going to use tabs or spaces... *these* are the important issues!

ROFL I'll be proud if I find that they're ending all their lines in semi-colons;

Funny note on metric. One of it's big benefits is the simplicity of converting as everything is based in 10's. We had a customer specifically ask us to change the dimensions on our drawings from mm to cm because their people couldn't do the conversion.

I had the same request for some plans I had drawn up. I had then in cm but was asked to change it to mm because "nobody uses cm in drawings anymore." It was easy enough to change