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Coders Working Without the Use of Their Hands?
Hagmonk asks: "Recently I crashed my motorbike at the racetrack and severely broke my left arm (sorry, nobody caught it on camera). I had a week in hospital, which was a problem since I'm contracting and you don't get paid for sick leave. Furthermore, I have my arm in a cast for 6 weeks (possibly another 6 again after that), which severely cramps my hacking style - no fast switches to other windows to make quick changes, and you should try operating emacs without two hands! Luckily, my employer was generous enough to purchase a hinged keyboard that allows me to type two handed. So I'm interested to hear from other hackers: how have you coped with injuries that stop you doing what you were born to do? Could you find a work around? Did you experience prejudice in the work place as a result, or were you supported?"
I think you have to use your mouse a lot and develop RSI in your other arm...
-- Cheers!
nice bike ;)
There are two alternate Dvorak keymaps, in addition to the one that most people refer to (and I'm typing with now) when they say 'dvorak'. Dvorak developed a right and a left keymaping, which were designed for the physically handicapped.
These keymaps are set up to be minimal for english text with one hand. Give it a look-see, you might have them on your platform.
-- Crutcher --
#include <disclaimer.h>
I think about this some times: what if I can't type for some time and loose a great deal of money because of that? :-) ) Is there any insurance that we can get on this cases (like accident insurance or similar) that would save our asses on this kind of misfortune?
In your case, what if you've broken both of your arms? (hope this never happens
Utinam logica falsa tuam philosophiam totam suffodiant!
vi
True warriors use the Klingon Google
This is why God invented short-term disability insurance. Also, try not to engage in activities that would cramp your work style. :)
--Mike
A former colleague was paralized from the neck down in an accident. He had some movement of his arms, but his hands where quite useless. At least he could manouvre the joystick of his electric wheelchair. He had some tools that could be strapped to his hands, i.a. to hold cups, cutlery and the telephone receiver. Also 2 metallic "fingers" with rubber tips that allowed him to type and mouse. Not as fast as 10 fingers, but he got through his workload.
Talk about an expensive lifestyle, what with all the adaptations to house, vehicle etc., medical costs,...!
Anyhow, back to topic: At some stage I moved the mouse to left of keyboard so that I could use my strong (right) hand for typing and still keeping the mouse ready. Saved a lot of time when switching between mouse-input and keyboard-input (which I did a lot at the time). Since I have fairly big hands, one-handed input was not too hard.
Sorry about your wreck and being laid up.
Even though I have two fairly functional hands, I've often thought how nice it would be to use one of these devices, particularly at meetings, where it would gauche to layout a laptop and using a PDA pen is less than satisfactory. I'll have to admit that furiuosly chording one of these devices in your lap under the table could look kind of suspicious.
Using chorded input on the one handed device seems to allow something like 4K possible input "characters", so even if you needed to map every emacs major mode's lisp function to a key you'd have an easier time than with a typical QWERTY board.
The advertisement suggests you can learn to use one of these in about a weekend. If you do, let me know if you like it or not.
"Provided by the management for your protection."
Left it's ok, only wank with the other. But its a bugger if you can't use Alt-F4 to close those damn pop-ups ....
I had a week in hospital, which was a problem since I'm contracting and you don't get paid for sick leave... Luckily, my employer was generous enough to purchase a hinged keyboard that allows me to type two handed.
You cannot be a contractor and have an employer. You might be an employee of a firm that has contracted some work on a larger project, but, from your point of view, contracting is incompatible with employment.
In a perfect world, there wouldn't be a government, much less a bolshevist gang of mafiosi like the Internal Revenue Service. Unfortunately, in the real world, the IRS has draconian rules about the sacred employer/employee relationship. If an IRS drone were to read this post and then initiate an audit of you, the fact that this entity had purchased you a keyboard would be very strong prima facie evidence that you were its employee, and, if that entity were found to be your employer, it would become liable for both the employer & employee sides of FICA & Medicare/Medicaid, as well as federal, state, and local income tax, state unemployment tax, union dues, and gosh only knows what other levies, fines, extortions and bribes.
It's very difficult to remain an independent businessman in the face of Section 1706. Keep a rigid boundary between you and the entity that contracts for your services.
that wasn't your whacking hand was it? ;-)
if it was, that means you'll have to operate the mouse and whacking with the same hand. better get used to cleaning lotion off of your mouse.
THERE IS NO DATA. THERE IS O
This place has a big selection of alternative keyboards including some one handed ones.
http://www.keyalt.com/
My comments may be crap...but they are my crap...and I am brave enough to stand by them...Never post as AC!
Step 1: Work neekid.
Step 2: Always have Pr0n going in the corner of the screen.
Step 3: Viola, a 3rd finger to hold the ctrl keys with.
Sorry, only works if your male.
Ok, now lets see if the moderators are smart enough to tell the difference between humor and a troll.
All Troll + "offtopic" mods are meta moderated as "Unfair", because you abused the system.
I broke my wrist in a motorcycle accident a year ago. I had an external fixator on my arm for about 8 weeks.
I actually found that I could type (albeit quite slowly) with my bad hand. And the more I typed, the more flexibility I got back in my hand. Rotating my arm so that my palm was flat on the keyboard was an excellent (and painful) stretching exercise.
So I suggest (with your doctor's approval) that you try and use your broken arm as much as possible. It maintained some of the manual dexterity in my hand and helped me recover more quickly. I have recovered about 99%. I occasionaly still get some stiffness in my wrist, but just reqires a break and some stretching which is a good habit regardless.
Steve
Try not to engage in work that prevents you from doing what you want in your spare time. ;).
Just a thought
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
You can't type with your feet, but you should be able to rig up some foot pedals for the meta keys (meta, alt, control, shift, and perhaps others) that will help in emacs.
I've met coders who prefer a trackball on the floor with foot pedals instead of a mouse, that might help too.
Have a look at the Half keyboard. There's a demo that only works on windows and mac:-( But I rebooted to windows to see the demo - looks pretty descent.
Prejudice is when you judge someone before knowing the facts. It sounds like your employer knows all the facts in this case.
www.naturalpoint.com -- this is a hands-free mouse that you aim by head motion, and click with an add-on footpad. I've been using it for about a year because of rms (the medical syndrome, not the guy). I also have an ergonomic keyboard-cum-chair from ErgoKinesis, and they might have some adaptive keyboard products you'd find useful.
BTW, the comments on the order of "just whack off with the other hand" are pretty damn insensitive, if you ask me.
How is he supposed to continue his geek masturbation quest? HE WAS ABOUT TO LEVEL!
Back during the boomtime, I developed severe case of RSI after coding for 3 days straight to the point that I couldn't type. Since my company had a pretty large warchest, they sprung for an intern typist while my arms recovered. it was pretty painful sounding out every key combination...
There is a one handed mouse/keyboard combo, more of a hocky puck with buttons on it that you hold called Twiddler from Handy Key . I've not trieded it, but I've always been meaning to.
I broke both hands in a bicycle accident three years ago. Bi-lateral, almost mirror image fractures, a inch and quarter hollow, titanium drywall screw in each thumb. At the time my wife was five months pregnant and until the harness came off (3rd degree shoulder separation) she was doing everything, I mean everything, for me.
A word of advice: use the hands. I worked straight through, only missing two days for surgery and the day of the accident; typing with just the middle fingers of each hand. It will make your shoulder stronger and shorten your rehab. Your rehab will go much faster if you are using your hand before you get the cast off. Avoid the mouse when possible. You might consider some voice interface software, as well. And stretch!
illegitimii non ingravare
A previous employer told me that Shanghai was written by a disabled programmer, using Blow. I can't find anything on the web to confirm this. Anyone got data?
Says the RIAA: When you EQ, you're stealing bass!
Hear, hear!
I could never cheat on my primary hand like that!
Acting as the front end you will need to stump up $40 for IBms IBM ViaVoice Dictation for Linux.
troodon.net
Doesn't it sort of crimp your style? It's tough being without a love life due to injury.
There is an interesting experimental keyboard-less input program called Dasher. The current program is oriented towards ordinary text, for written language input (e.g. to allow the disabled to send emails). What would be interesting would be to customise this for program editing, possibly inside an IDE. E.g. to build in the main language constructs, and to replace the English language dictionary by the table of symbols valid at the point you are editing. Another approach to predictive editing.
Consciousness is an illusion caused by an excess of self consciousness.
Mr Hawking seems to have gotten the handsfree thing down pretty well over the past few years. He probably has the best system ever. I want to get a simalar system for my grandmother, because she had a stoke and can't talk really now, but I can't afford such a thing, unless he made it open source and someone game me the hardware.
Tibbon
tibbon.com