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Down the ergonomic keyboard rabbit hole

blog.scottlogic.com

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Re: Down the ergonomic keyboard rabbit hole

#71

Post by kostarelo »

petercooper wrote: post #3

Quite the rabbit hole and definitely worth the read :-) This seems a good place to bring up an odd experience of mine. I've had carpal tunnel for decades but no longer get many flare ups. After trying numerous keyboards, the solution turned out to be using Apple's Magic Keyboard and whatever their huge trackpad is called. The key for me seems to be low key travel, a smallish keyboard (to avoid any stretching), and av…

That's super interesting, thanks for sharing. Is the magic keyboard and trackpad considered to be ergonomic? I wonder what's the difference then in split keyboards and such.

Re: Down the ergonomic keyboard rabbit hole

#72

Post by vbernat »

StevenWaterman wrote: post #52
bsimpson wrote: post #51

The author's narration is delightful. Really nice to hear the voice of the author, the meta commentary on his own writing, and the proud glee he takes in captioning his doodles.

I'm really glad you enjoyed it! I've never done that before, but it just felt like the perfect opportunity.

I have also enjoyed it. This is really good for accessibility. I suppose you use the "timeupdate" event and "scrollIntoView()" to sync text and audio but I would be interested to read more on how you have achieved this.

Re: Down the ergonomic keyboard rabbit hole

#73

Post by megameter »

bosie wrote: post #53
nix23 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No do some boulders, best training for your hole body and you don't even feel it (mainly because you don't want to fall down), BUT start slow and easy for the first 3 month, your ligaments need much MUCH longer to grow strong than your muscles.

Silly question but how do you start bouldering with CTS? I tried it (and weight training) but grabing any heavy weight seems very painful

1. Supplementing helped me with grip. Specifically D3 and magnesium supplements.

2. Practice hanging from a pull-up bar. Calisthenics routines often include "passive and active hangs" and doing these for long holds is a good grip trainer.

Re: Down the ergonomic keyboard rabbit hole

#74

Post by nix23 »

bosie wrote: post #53
nix23 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No do some boulders, best training for your hole body and you don't even feel it (mainly because you don't want to fall down), BUT start slow and easy for the first 3 month, your ligaments need much MUCH longer to grow strong than your muscles.

Silly question but how do you start bouldering with CTS? I tried it (and weight training) but grabing any heavy weight seems very painful

Not a silly question, you just make routes where your body-weight is 80% on your feet (but that's always the goal), warmup your hands before 5min under really warm water. If it still hurts too much stabilize your hands looks like that:

https://frictionlabs.com/blog/taping-fingers-in-rock-climbin...

But ask your doctor how to stabilize your hand optimally.

And again start slow no weight on the hands, it's about moving them, not overload them (at least in the first 3 month..or more)

Oh and Gyroscopes are extremely good for warmup and for breaks at work.

And no painkillers when you do climbing/boulders.

Re: Down the ergonomic keyboard rabbit hole

#75

Post by StevenWaterman »

bredren wrote: post #37
positr0n wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've experimented with putting some or all of my modifier keys under non-pinky keys like O on my ergodox. My problem with that is that it forces me to drastically slow down my typing. Otherwise typing a word like "word" will register as 'w ctrl-r d'. I have not found a timeout value that will always register "word" when I'm typing at 110wpm and also Ctrl-r when I'm just lazily hitting that single hotkey :/ It's eithe…

I’m two weeks into the ergodox ez, using the onyx trainer a bit each morning. It is just okay, almost wish there was something better. It lags and stuff typing Alice. How are y’all handling shift? Left Shift is my pinky’s biggest pain. I saw this hold the key for shift option, people using that?

I used https://www.keybr.com/ which took ages but felt satisfying, slowly unlocking new letters

Re: Down the ergonomic keyboard rabbit hole

#76

Post by Baeocystin »

tmoravec wrote: post #65
bsimpson wrote: post #63

It's amazing that we constantly use tools with dozens of buttons permanently fixed to them, but rarely think about how we might yield those buttons to our own purposes. We just accept the defaults without considering other possibilities. Also gets into the idea of personalized UI more generally. You can imagine something like Photoshop ought to adapt what tools it shows based on how someone uses it. Then again, that…

It's a surprisingly complex problem. As you point out, more personalised UI, buttons, etc. can be more ergonomic and presumably productive. But then the problem with learning, teaching, and sharing arises. I also see another problem: lock-in and loss of productivity in other environments. For this reason I prefer to stick to everything as vanilla as possible: so that I can use another computer or keyboard and it "jus…

Right there with you. The ability to use any system you happen to be in front of without issue is a huge boon in and of itself. I have friends who spend hours customizing every little keybind, using uncommon peripherals, etc.

Does it make them more productive? I honestly have my doubts. The number of times I've had to wait during a group project because a software update broke their keybinds, they're at another desk and are now slow because they don't have the muscle memory for 'standard' layouts, etc is not even close to zero. Even on their own systems, they spend significant time every week tweaking things. For many, I think it is a form of bikeshedding as much as anything.

Re: Down the ergonomic keyboard rabbit hole

#77

Post by tharne »

ZeroGravitas wrote: post #30
dkersten wrote: post #11

I use a slightly configured Kinesis Advantage 2 and colemak as my keyboard layout (I used to make the Kinesis do the colemak, but now its just qwerty and the OS handles colemak). I find typing on it extremely comfortable. I've also found these beneficial: https://www.mycarpaltunnel.com/ I like Ergodox, especially because of their super flexible configuration, but I dislike the flatness of the keyboard compared to the…

The makers of the Ergodox EZ (it's open source so you can get Ergodoxes from various sources as well as build your own) also make the Moonlander, which is a step closer to the Kinesis in shape. I looked into it as a potentially more mobile alternative to the Kinesis but decided to stick with the Kinesis. I'm hoping if my current keyboard ever dies Kinesis will have a new QMK-based version that comes in two halves, or…

Dactyl manuform user here. That's definitely my only complaint. The dactyl is the absolute perfect keyboard, except for the fact that it's a nightmare to transport anywhere. If I have to take it anywhere I carry it in a paper shopping bag with nothing else in it. It's not a cheap keyboard either, so getting one for work and one for home is a hit to the wallet.

I recently grabbed a keyboardio atreus for travel and laptop use. Not nearly as ergonomic as the dactyl, but still a very nice keyboard in it's own right.

Re: Down the ergonomic keyboard rabbit hole

#78

Post by cweagans »

IshKebab wrote: post #46

The problem with learning an alternative keyboard layout is that it makes you suck at QWERTY. I didn't realise how much I type on other people's keyboard until I tried to learn Dvorak.

While you're learning, you'll probably suck at both layouts. Once you've mastered the new layout, switching is really not so bad (at least for me).

Re: Down the ergonomic keyboard rabbit hole

#79

Post by hailwren »

dkersten wrote: post #11

I use a slightly configured Kinesis Advantage 2 and colemak as my keyboard layout (I used to make the Kinesis do the colemak, but now its just qwerty and the OS handles colemak). I find typing on it extremely comfortable. I've also found these beneficial: https://www.mycarpaltunnel.com/ I like Ergodox, especially because of their super flexible configuration, but I dislike the flatness of the keyboard compared to the…

You have to build it by hand, but check out the Dactyl or Dactyl Manuform. I think they're about the pinnacle of the erg keyboard world. 3d shape like a Kinesis but with more optimization for wrist angle and allows you to customize wrist rotation and split.

Re: Down the ergonomic keyboard rabbit hole

#80

Post by samatman »

When I purchased my Ergodox, I also discovered that I cross-type the letter Y, and my muscle memory would lead me to hit a layer key instead, in the default layout, which would cause a bunch of the letter keys to do different things.

My solution was to reprogram the layer key to be a null key that doesn't do anything, so instead of "Y equals your keyboard is now broken" it was "Y means nothing happens". I kept it that way for a couple weeks, until my nervous system was rewired, and turned it back into a layer key.

These days, the remaining problem is that I've moved a few 'glyph' keys, so when I'm on the laptop my fingers go to the wrong place when I try to type e.g. "-". It's like I have two modes with substantial overlap, and sometimes it takes awhile to switch to the laptop mode.

Not the end of the world, and more than made up for by the convenience and ergonomics of the Ergodox.

Edit to add: from this and other reports, it's clear that for some people, the ortholinear layout requires substantial adjustment. I wasn't one of those people, it was a rapid accommodation and I don't consciously notice switching between ortholinear and staggered. It would be nice if there were a way for people to guess which category they're in, before shelling out $300 and change on a keyboard!

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