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What Does a Coder Do If They Can't Type?

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Re: What Does a Coder Do If They Can't Type?

#161

Post by scottlamb »

tarsinge wrote: post #26
m12k wrote: post #10

That story of how the doctors just dismissed her pain as delusion is terrifying. Doctors are supposed to be people of science, but one of the very fundamentals of science is to acknowledge that you don't know everything, that your current knowledge is just a theory that can be improved upon. I find there's a tendency among doctors to think they know every possible disease, and if someone comes along with one that doe…

Psychosomatic diseases are a real thing though. You can have real physical symptoms. Last year my muscles started to « shake », with lots of skipped heartbeats (extrasystoles). After all the checks the doctors said the classic « it’s stress ». Well then I took a real break and embarked on multi month road trip on another continent. The symptoms disappeared nearly overnight. I think I experienced a burnout but it mani…

> Psychosomatic diseases are a real thing though. You can have real physical symptoms.

+1. Several people at work have reported that "The Mindbody Prescription: Healing the Body, Healing the Pain" helped their wrist pain go away.

YMMV. But just as doctors shouldn't dismiss the idea symptoms are due to a "real" (read: physical) condition, folks suffering shouldn't dismiss the idea they can be cured (or greatly improved) through non-physical means, even if there is some physical origin.

I haven't tried this book myself. I've had wrist/forearm/hand problems (weakness, tingling/numbness, pain, loss of flexibility, diagnosed as carpal tunnel and tendonitis), but they largely went away before I'd heard of the book. I think a bunch of things helped me, including wrist exercises suggested by a physical therapist, TENS (administered by the physical therapist), time, Qi Gong, meditation/relaxation techniques (I'd always had a lot of muscle tension, including tension headaches), and (later on) resuming rock climbing and weight lifting. So some combination of physical and mental changes.

Re: What Does a Coder Do If They Can't Type?

#162

Post by csomar »

mwiethoff wrote: post #115

I developed an RSI a few years ago, and I had to leave my job. It was devastating to lose both my career and my passion to an injury. Since then, I've been working with a friend on a new voice coding app called Serenade [1] that aims to enable anyone to program by voice. With Serenade, you can speak natural English voice commands like "delete second function" and "add class person". Not only can this be faster than t…

I gave it a shot. Here is my feedback:

1- It doesn't recgonize my voice very well. I know that my accent is not that good, but Google has around 9~% accuracy. This had maybe 10%!

2- Why a VSCode plugin? Why not make it at the OS level. So I can type with my voice anywhere I want.

3- Being able to customize the commands myself.

Re: What Does a Coder Do If They Can't Type?

#163

Post by shocks »

What worked for me is:

- First stabilising by avoiding all unnecessary usage

- Avoid wrist straps, they make it worse because your muscles will atrophy

- Learn stretching and strengthening exercises from a physio

- Use a Kinesis Advantage and a trackball

- Avoid pronation

- Start rock climbing, to make my arms/wrists strong

Since then, I rarely have pain.

You can get short term relief from dunking your wrists in ice cold water (reduces inflammation).

Re: What Does a Coder Do If They Can't Type?

#164

Post by mwiethoff »

xtagon wrote: post #159
mwiethoff wrote: post #115

I developed an RSI a few years ago, and I had to leave my job. It was devastating to lose both my career and my passion to an injury. Since then, I've been working with a friend on a new voice coding app called Serenade [1] that aims to enable anyone to program by voice. With Serenade, you can speak natural English voice commands like "delete second function" and "add class person". Not only can this be faster than t…

That's incredible! Does it work with any programming language?

Right now it works best for python. We’ve got early versions of JavaScript and Java out too. We’re also releasing HTML and CSS soon.

Re: What Does a Coder Do If They Can't Type?

#165

Post by cwkoss »

It is interesting to consider how the ability to speak code with the specificity necessary for a computer to know what to do would probably also vastly improve your ability to communicate in pair-programming type situations.

Re: What Does a Coder Do If They Can't Type?

#168

Post by allannienhuis »

Benjamin_Dobell wrote: post #155
allannienhuis wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Learning to play the guitar is a surprisingly good way to increase your hand strength - mostly the left/off hand, but not exclusively. Learning to play the piano has similar hand strength benefits. Obviously overdoing it in both cases can lead to it's own RSI issues. But just getting past the beginner stage really adds a lot of strength & dexterity.

I've certainly read this before, however are there any studies that back this up? I played guitar before I got RSI. Now, I can't play for more than a few minutes at a time without ending up in pain - despite my RSI being under control for work purposes. Actually, there's nothing quite like playing guitar in terms of causing me pain well after finishing the activity. Certain things like lifting heavy furniture, or usi…

I wasn't trying to say that playing guitar was a treatment or therapy for RSI symptoms. Obviously any type of hand exercise can make things worse while your hand/wrist/ligaments are inflamed or you're otherwise subject to flareups of RSI.

The general idea in this thread was that increasing finger/hand strength could be a preventative action for people worried about RSI, and I think that's a reasonable train of thought - and playing guitar certainly does improve hand strength.

I think it's fair to say that no preventative action is 100% effective for the kinds of things we're talking about. I'm pretty sure other activities and factors, including genetics and luck play a lot into whether that increased hand strength is enough to prevent RSI in any individual case.

I do think it's good to bring it up as a warning though - it's very possible for any activity that uses the hands a lot to contribute to RSI symptoms rather than help, and people should really pay attention to what their body is telling them :)

Sorry to hear you're not able to play as much as you'd like - it's been one of my favorite things to do when I need to get away from the computer, and I'm super grateful it hasn't caused my RSI to return.

Re: What Does a Coder Do If They Can't Type?

#169

Post by mwiethoff »

csomar wrote: post #162
mwiethoff wrote: post #115

I developed an RSI a few years ago, and I had to leave my job. It was devastating to lose both my career and my passion to an injury. Since then, I've been working with a friend on a new voice coding app called Serenade [1] that aims to enable anyone to program by voice. With Serenade, you can speak natural English voice commands like "delete second function" and "add class person". Not only can this be faster than t…

I gave it a shot. Here is my feedback: 1- It doesn't recgonize my voice very well. I know that my accent is not that good, but Google has around 9~% accuracy. This had maybe 10%! 2- Why a VSCode plugin? Why not make it at the OS level. So I can type with my voice anywhere I want. 3- Being able to customize the commands myself.

Thanks for the feedback! We’re actively working on improving the speech engine, apologies it didn’t work well for you. We’re starting with editor plugins, but eventually want to expand to other apps as well. Definitely want to support customization down the line too.

Re: What Does a Coder Do If They Can't Type?

#170

Post by 59nadir »

martamoreno2 wrote: post #166

A coder does two things: * He gets this Keyboard: https://kinesis-ergo.com/shop/advantage2/ * He reads this blog: https://www.thepaleomom.com/start-here/the-autoimmune-protoc... And fixes himself...

I just want to caution against this advice as it's very likely to be dangerous and counterproductive for anyone who actually has real issues with their hands. The solution is to stop typing immediately.
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