Should the keyboard be angled towards or away from me?
I have removed the wrist rests.
Sorry for being so verbose. You see in my younger days I used to be a
reporter getting paid by the word! ;-)
But seriously I am writing all this not only for you but for others also
who might be following this thread.
And thirdly I am firm believer in not only telling people what to do but
to explain the reasons behind the thinking.
As a Chinese saying goes, "Tell me how to do it and I will forget. Show
me how to do it and I might remember. But let me do it and I will remember!"
And since the only option for me here is to tell you and others how to
do it, I have to lay out the reason behind my thinking hoping that they
will grasp the logic behind my thinking or rather my method.
And do make sure to study those web pages with the URLs I have indicated
below.
Look at a standard keyboard for desktops. It has got feet at the back to
raise the back just by about 1 inch. So if you are using a laptop, get
something (I use a gel wrist rest) to insert under the far backside of
the laptop to raise the back of the laptop by just under 1 inch. The
exact angle will depend on the front to back measurement of your laptop
and the height of whatever you use to raise the back. The keyboard
should slope slightly upwards away from you (but only by around 10 degrees).
Incidentally Samsung are apparently manufacturing a small laptop/netbook
with exactly this angling of the keyboard. It looks like somebody has
got the message at long last.
Here, have a look at this Apple keyboard and see how that tubular thing
at the back (the battery compartment it actually is) raises the back of
the keyboard by around 10 degrees by raising the back by around an inch.
I am a touch typist and used to write news stories at 80 wpm all day
long; so you can rest assured that I know what I am talking about. And
that was on old mechanical typewriters which had keyboards sloping
upwards away from the typist. That design was for a reason!
A keyboard laid out flat as on laptops is guarantee of RSI, as they call
it. I said RSI is a misnomer. It is NOT the repetitive strain that
causes the injury but the fact that those prone to RSI have not learned
to relax their muscles in between, so to speak. Muscles cannot be held
in any specific tension for long. And this is quite easy to prove. Just
raise your arms to shoulder height and hold them horizontal for a few
minutes without moving them. The arms will soon start feeling heavy and
tired. Now, hold your arms at the same height but move them around, up
and down, draw figures of 8 or any other shape. So long as they are
moving up and down, the shoulder muscles tense up and relax. In other
words they do not remain tensed up for long. Remember it is
Tension>Relaxation. So long as this Tension>Relaxation cycle is
continued the shoulders automatically relax as the arms move downwards.
I know what I am talking about, believe me. For 8 years in my younger
days I was in the news business and I used to write the equivalent of a
paperback every 3 weeks or so. Now, that was a lot of typing especially
on the old mechanical keyboards and I never got RSI. That could be due
to the fact that I actually studied music which involves a lot of
fingerwork and heaven help you if you haven't learned to relax if you
are training to become a professional musician.
A good book to read is "Zen in the Art of Archery" by Eugen Herrigel.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-m...05090/ref=cm_ciu_pdp_images_2?ie=UTF8&index=2
Mind you, you might have to read it several times before the message
sinks in. The book is all about relaxing and letting things happen. You
don't do things. You let them happen. You don't for example aim the
arrow but just release it. Doesn't make sense to our Western way of
thinking, does it? Of course not. But, and here is my understanding of
it, exactly the same thing happened in the Wild West. The cowboys did
not AIM their pistols. No, they fired from the hip. And that, I can tell
you, is very Zen. A good musician can play his instrument, be it a piano
or a cello, in complete darkness. And how can an archer score a bull's
eye hit when, in complete darkness, he cannot even see the tip of his
arrow? But to achieve all this he has got to be perfectly relaxed. If
you read that book carefully several times, the idea will sink in.
Here is another proof that not doing anything can be very tiring and
very demanding of the physical sinews and muscles. Go for a one hour
stroll either window-shopping or walking through the woods. Another day
try standing absolutely still for an hour and see which will tire you
out! ;-)
Strolling will require you to tense and relax your muscles in quick
succession. Standing still your muscles will remain somewhat tensed up
without relaxing and this will tire you out in no time. Raising your
arms to shoulder level and holding them absolutely still, you will soon
notice the effects of the slight tension that is needed to hold your
arms so very still at shoulder height.
And do not forget to give your wrists and fingers a well deserved rest
since you have obviously been mistreating them. If the pain is not too
bad you can exercise them a bit and dip them in hot water to relax the
muscles and tendons while also encouraging blood flow to combat the heat.
Some people use ice to the same effect to cause blood to rush to the
area, this time to warm up that part of the body. I prefer the hot water
approach as it also helps relax the sinews and muscles.
--
choro
*****
PS. Sorry if I made a mess of things as I seem to be doing several jobs
at once after a completely sleepless night. I just haven't got the
patience to read through what I have written.
And if you want to ask me to clarify any point, I promise to be very
brief and to the point next time. ;-)
