Ok, well final story is, i rummaged around and found some wired keyboards and mice. It was a little frustrating, but i finally found a pair that seemed to function. I'm still not sure what the point of 3 mouse buttons is; it seems like right and left click do the same thing(that is with the mouse i was able to actually get working - maybe RISC OS doesn't like any of my mice). Also the [FN]+Q,W,E,arrows trick didn't work on my keyboard that actually had a Function key. I guess i could have rummaged more(and maybe i will), but my hardware generally works fine with the linux distros I have used(mostly MX). It seems like some more work could be done here. Also, my wifi dongle seems to be recognized but incorrectly as a usb-ethernet interface, so i have an IP, but no internet, and i can't find a way to change that. riscosopen.org says sign-ups are disabled i need to email the webmaster; maybe i will; i am interested in trying out RISC OS, but it doesn't give me much confidence with my experience so far. ...it looks like MX still publishes a 32bit version, so i guess i can try and run that on my old Model 2 B+? ...but i bet it's going to have the same problem with no web-browser. So i guess all my 32bit stuff is bricks now? on a side note, i noticed some degradation in the desktop experience with the latest version of MX on my old laptop(it is a Thinkpad T510 with an intel i5). It is still functional, but i can feel the walls closing in.
Well, i went back to raspi os, and installed midori, and it successfully ran and loaded a page, though it quickly became apparent that raspbery pi os on an old model 2 B+ was not going to work(cpu + mem overload = slow) I have a vague memory of connecting a screen+keyboard+mouse to my raspi some years ago, though I can't really remember what the UX was like. In any case, it is unusable now with the latest version of raspi os. Here's a pic if you don't believe me(not that it is very much proof, but notice the scan is messed up - there is no way to fix it apparently): https://i.postimg.cc/3NjBDR6f/KIMG0503.jpg
I'm going to have to figure out another solution for my idea of turning TVs into cheap workstations. Sadly it seems like nobody is interested in making retro-computing accessible, and my favorite brand of linux seems to be slowly moving on to new hardware support(things seem degraded after updating). It's just that it makes it hard to participate(and contribute) when simple setup is so difficult, and hardware support becomes degraded. Maybe there is some project out there i just haven't seen yet that will fix all my problems, but it just seems less likely the longer i hang around. Actually there are a few options that come to mind, but testing OSs takes time, and so i think i'll just leave it at that for now.
