Comment by tempguy9999 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by tempguy9999 | Hacker News Reader

I was off work with it for literally years so I guess I'm an expert. WRT my own body anyway. Here's my advice.

All the fancy keyboard make no difference if you type too much. Pre RSI I'd type out some code, consider it carefully, rewrite it, reconsider and rewrite. Only then would it be run. It multiplied up the amount of typing I'd do. Now I'll think it through before putting hand on keyboard. No experience with dvorak but logically less typing must beat a 'better' layout.

Emails are shorter now. Just practice getting to the point. Writing docs, I used the dragon voice recognition. It works acceptably when trained, though that is not a quick and painless process.

I have a kinesis keyboard and its splitting/tilting don't help. But, because it lacks a number pad to the right it means I can place my trackball closer, so less risk of shoulder stress from reaching further out sideways. That's very worth it.

I found a mouse to be bad, something to do with pressing the button on top. I now use a trackball. I suspect that's specific to me though.

Above all, when it starts hurting, stop, and for a decent period of time - "But I can't afford to stop!" will be your response. Well, you will stop, nolens volens, it'll just be whether you choose to or your body packing up.

Hand RSI is really bad, I have it now and it'll never go away. It gets better but it's taken over a decade and I'll have it forever. So please note my the para about it hurts so stop.

Also be really cautious about any device that claims to help RSI such as those gyroscopic hand exercisers. They can help when it's improved (IME anyway), but when it's bad it will aggravate it.

All the above my own experience, with a grain of salt as everyone's different - except for the bit about "when it starts hurting, stop" cos I think that's probably universal.

Really unergonomic typing form and posture combined with horrendously unergonomic equipment and furniture is pretty much the standard in most office jobs. (For people who have spent time thinking about the subject, it’s quite depressing to walk around offices and see a large proportion of the workers typing with constantly extended wrists, arms outstretched, hunched or slouched backs, etc.)

It is entirely possible to type (at high speed in continuous bursts of 20–30m, with short breaks between) for 5+ hours per day every day for decades without injuries. The key is to reduce static load on the muscles and put joints in a neutral position, and make sure to occasionally move around.

It used to be that people who did such work first went to secretary school where they were trained in the proper form by experts. Now, everyone teaches themselves with no external feedback, and uses whatever equipment they happen to find lying around, most of which was incompetently designed, with a heavy priority on cost cutting. Almost no office workers are trained in office ergonomics.

The office furniture and computer hardware industries (along with government research funders, etc.) have been underinvesting in ergonomics research for 40+ years. The keyboards now are worse than what was typically used in the 1970s–80s, and desks and chairs are generally about the same. Official ergonomics standards developed by national and international organizations simply codify existing bad practices instead of trying to work out better designs from first principles.

What ergonomics research is done typically investigates how (small samples of) people will react to very slightly different design choices in the short term if given no training and little adjustment time. Usually the measurements taken are methodologically suspect. It’s a mess.

Different experience here.

Split keyboards allow you to keep your keep your wrists at a more neutral position vs having your forearms rotated inward but then twisting the wrists outward in order to type on a flat keyboard.. It absolutely helps with my RSI and if I have to use a flat keyboard for an extended period of time I start to get wrist pain.

A split keyboard and ergonomic trackball such as a Microsoft Trackball Explorer or Elecom Deft Pro, combined with a weight training workout, essentially solved RSI for me.

> I found a mouse to be bad, something to do with pressing the button on top.

This is my main RSI issue as well. Suddenly stopped being able to click a mouse one day, and still can't 10+ years later without pain. Even doing the motion in the air causes finger pain. Would love to find a way to fix it. Instead I use a TrackPoint with thumb buttons.

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