What Is This, a Cyberdeck for Toddlers?

Almost every cyberdeck we've covered has been a project that an adult built for themselves, either because they want a custom computer to fit their unique needs or because they simply enjoy the aesthetic. But if there is one thing I know about toddlers, it is that they love pushing buttons and flipping switches — especially when doing so returns feedback in the form of blinking lights and fun sounds. Josh figured that might be a great way to keep his two-year-old son occupied, so he built the Toddler's Cyberdeck.

Josh knew that toddlers don't care about processing power, support for Kali Linux, or mechanical key switch spring rates. So this isn't really a usable computer, but rather a toy that resembles a computer — similar to the toy lawnmowers and toy cell phones that young children seem to enjoy so much. It needs to stand up to the kind of abuse that only a toddler can impart on a device, so Josh built the entire thing intoa Pelican-style hard case. The lid of the case contains an LCD screen that loops videos, while the base contains a series of buttons, knobs, and switches.

The Toddler Cyberdeck does, in fact, include a single-board computer salvaged from a promotional video display. But its only purpose is to feed a video signal to the LCD screen and the toddler can't actually interact with it. A magnetic switch tells the SBC when the lid is open, at which point it will loop video until the lid closes again.

The base is a completely separate system controlled by an Arduino Mega 2560 board and powered by two 18650 lithium battery cells. The Arduino looks at the states of all of the various inputs and illuminates the LEDs accordingly. So flipping a switch to "on" will tell the Arduino to provide power to the corresponding LED through an analog pin. But Josh wanted this cyberdeck to grow with his son, so he can increase the complexity to create new behavior, such as logic puzzles, by updating the Arduino code.

Interestingly, Josh used ChatGPT to generate almost all of the Arduino code for this project. He linked to his complete conversation with ChatGPT, so you can see the entire process. That is quite enlightening and it ultimately let Josh build this cyberdeck for his son.