Planning

Get agreement

Before you do anything else, get the agreement of the person you're caring for (TPYCF). They might be nervous of the idea of having a computer, or the internet, so concentrate on describing the benefits, rather than the technology. Reassure them - they won't have to do anything special. If a health professional has heard of initiative such as this, and can be brought on board, all the better.

Think about the money. As well as the one-off cost of the equipment (about £400 for mum), there's the ISP charges. Most, if not all, the software ought to be available free, through open source channels. The only other charge you might want to pay is a subscription (currently $20 a year) to a company such as DynDns¹. You can get this for free; I chose to pay to save myself the hassle of having to confirm periodically that I want to keep it.

Hardware and physical environment

How much space is there, for the computer, screen, modem, and possibly router, if it is not included with the modem? This will influence the hardware that you buy.

Where are you going to site it? Ideally it's going to be where TPYCF spends a lot of time. Think about privacy (there's a web cam). Think about health and safety issues - no trailing leads and so on.

If the computer is to be sited away from the modem/router, how will you connect? Can you run an ethernet cable between the two? Wireless is possible, but remote trouble shooting could be tricky. Are powerlines possible?

Internet

Which ISP will you choose? Consider speed, price, and technical support. Who can you turn to if you get stuck, and the ISP can't or won't help? What other sources of help are available?

¹ Most ISPs allocate dynamic IP addresses; you need a fixed address to be sure of being able to contact TPYCF. DynDns have plenty of help on how to set it up, through a half-decent router, or through a program that runs on your computer as a service. The basic idea is that TPYCF's computer has a name that maps to the actual IP address allocated by the ISP. When the IP address changes, the router or program notifies DynDns.