A keyboard injury checklist for programmers
February 23, 2007 by Honolulu
Do you use vi editor a lot?
Do you use Hungarian notation when coding?
Does your left hand little finger hurt more than the others?
Do you touch type?
Do the tendons in your forearm ache?
How high is your chair?
Is your keyboard placed on the desk or on a tray?
Do you wear a watch on the left hand?
Do you rest your palms when you type or are they floating?
Here’s why: if you use the vi editor in unix/Linux, not only will you be doing more typing than those who use editors with auto-complete, you’ll also be using the shift key and ESC a lot for command purposes. If you touch type, you’ll be using your left little pinkie to press the ESC key.
Also, if you use Hungarian notation, you’ll be using a lot of underscores in your code, in addition to the usual curly braces, colons and double quotes, all of which require you to press the left SHIFT with your left little pinkie (if you touch type). So if your left little finger hurts, you should probably look into these things. Maybe you can switch to a windows editor by mapping your unix/Linux to windows using something like Samba.
Remember, some of the muscles that you use to press down on keys are located in your forearm. If you type too much or type in an awkward position, these should hurt. If your wrist or fingers hurt, it’s probably something else.
It’s better to have the keyboard in a low position, close to you, which is why a tray is a good idea.
Some people will never guess, but aches in one hand could be due to a wrist watch that is either too heavy or pressing against you when you type. If your left hand aches and you wear a watch on it, try taking it off when typing. It worked for me.
