One spilled cup of coffee and the $#@% thing is toast. It shouldn't be, since the voltage going through it is pretty low and the hardware is pretty simple, but there it is. The keyboard is dead. And who helped you spill the coffee? The same individual who ensures your minimum daily intake of pet hair. When you get a new keyboard, keep the old one. Make room near your usual workspace and place the keyboard there. Place a small heating pad under the keyboard. The cat, God willing, will be attracted to the much nicer, warmer keyboard that never gets him flung off the desk, and you can go back to work. Don't have a cat? Install a heating pad in your deader and sell it on eBay. Some lucky pet owner will snap it up, wondering why he hadn't thought of it first.
-- elhigh, Feb 05 2006

In memory Cat_20Computers
The original high tech cat man :-( [blissmiss, Feb 06 2006]

For those who don't know Run_2c_20Forrest_2c_20Run_2e
[blissmiss, Feb 06 2006]

//voltage going through// Current "goes through".
-- AbsintheWithoutLeave, Feb 05 2006


Sell it with a coffee-mug shaped squeaky toy?
-- jutta, Feb 05 2006


I'll try it! We have a cat that thinks she is an operating system programer.
-- llenk, Feb 05 2006


Does she? Maybe she is the actual operating system programmer, and you just think you are.

Bun for the idea. When I have a cat and a broken keyboard I will try this.
-- dbmag9, Feb 05 2006


I like the concept, but the cat usually messes with the keyboard because it's attracted to the movement and sounds of your fingers typing, not the keyboard itself. Perhaps if you could make it a self-typing keyboard, like a self-playing piano, it would work.
-- 21 Quest, Feb 06 2006


The heating pad almost makes the keyboard redundant.
-- Galbinus_Caeli, Feb 06 2006


This will never work. The cat is attracted to the keyboard because you are paying attention to it. Similarly, if you set a newspaper beside you, the cat remains solely interested in sitting on the page you are trying to read.
-- danrue, Feb 06 2006


Ah man, you brought back rfr to me. I wish some of the newer members would have known him. (And farmerjohn of course).
-- blissmiss, Feb 06 2006


I think liquid proof or, at least, resistant keyboards exist.
-- bristolz, Feb 06 2006


They do. They have a clear plastic sheet covering all the keys, fitted to each key.
-- 21 Quest, Feb 06 2006


I tried one of those spillproof membranes. I type so fast, though, that sometimes the membrane would snap through and suck itself onto my finger.

I like the self-playing keyboard idea. That'd be pretty funny. Slave it to the keyboard you're using, and all keystrokes are recreated on the deader. The cat would go _insane_.
-- elhigh, Feb 09 2006



halfbakery