Ask HN: Avoiding carpal tunnel / repetitive stress injuries

-Stop using a mouse. Use a trackball or a trackpad or anything else. I have a death grip on mice and I bet others do too.

-If you have to use a mouse switch your mousing hand. Deal with the fumbling and inaccuracy. You'll figure it out.

-Lean farr back in your chair(legs propped up) and rest your keyboard in your lap. Shift position occasionally.

-Move your monitor so that you look in different directions. Laptops are great for this and that compensates for their other ergonomic problems. You can usually find a way to move them higher or lower and correspondingly shift the strain.

  -switched the mouse to my left hand 
  -installed WorkRave, actually did what it said
  -switched the caps-lock and ctrl key
  -switched to dvorak
  -use the ergo microsoft keyboard
  -avoid laptops
  -learned to sit up straight and not cross my legs
  -stopped using the mouse scroll wheel

If you spend a lot of time coding, try to spend more time with a pencil and paper designing before you hit the keyboard. That gives you a good break and reduces the amount of typing and deleting you'll do.

Dvorak optimizes alternating hands (ever felt dumb typing "street" or "states" in Qwerty?), useful keys on the home row (aoeuidhtns VS asdfghjkl;), typing inwards (try tapping your fingers in rapid succession inwards on your desk. Now try outwards or in a random order...) and typing with the strong fingers (The farther from the pinky the better) and the right hand (usually the strongest one), among other things.

Those features reduce stress injury because they result in less finger movement and more natural dynamics.