If they don't, they should. RSI sucks.<p>At Google, they've got ergonomics evaluators on staff. You can schedule one to come by and check out how you're working. They'll fix your chair, remind you how to sit, mouse, and keyboard, and also put in orders for special equipment should you need it. Things like vertical oriented mice, natural keyboards, and boosters for your monitor can make a lot of difference for comfort.
Seats? Tables? What are those? ;-)<p>I suspect I'd give any ergonomic evaluator a heart attack. Right now, I'm lying down on the floor, propped up on my elbows. Other favored positions include cross-legged on the floor, kneeling on my bed with the laptop on my thighs, half-kneeling on the floor with my chin on my knee, prone in bed with about 3 pillows under my chest, in bed on my side wit my elbow propping my upper body up, reclining in a chair with the laptop on my lap and feet up, and sitting in a tree (no, I don't take the laptop up there, but I'll frequently bring pencil & paper to work out some design problem).<p>The one place I absolutely will not work if I have a choice about it is at a table or desk. Been like that since before I had a computer; in elementary school, I absolutely refused to do my homework at the table, always preferring the floor.<p>You'd think this would result in lots of RSI problems, but I haven't had anything since I was 12, which ironically was when my parents made a concerted effort to get me to sit at a desk and do my homework like a normal person. I suspect it's because I don't actually do anything repetitive at a computer. I get up to pace <i>a lot</i> - 5 times in the process of writing this comment, and I've switched to 3 different positions. That's another reason I really dislike desks - they make getting up a chore, so I don't get up, and so I find my productivity dropping off from lack of exercise.
Am I the only one who is not that thrilled by Aeron chairs? I took one over from my father, because he didn't like it, either, but I am also not happy with it. I find the plastic parts tend to cut into my legs and hurt me, because I sink into the rubber net too deeply. Also the settings are unstable, every now and then the chair collapses and I have to reconfigure it again. <p>OT: does anybody know how I can determine the exact model type of my Aeron chair, as I would like to put it up on ebay?
If you don't now, you will in a few years. It gets more painful as you get older--by the time I was in my mid-twenties I had to have a good chair or I'd have serious back pain. I also had to find ways to work with less mouse usage, or it would lead to shooting pains in my forearms.<p>I've settled into a nice place now, with a good monitor that raises up almost high enough (a Dell 2005), an Aeron chair, an IBM small form factor keyboard with good IBM keys, and a Logitech mouse that I still try to use as little as possible. I still have occasional back and shoulder pain, but I have some injuries from bike accidents in my youth. But I definitely take ergonomics seriously. I can't concentrate when I'm in pain.<p>One thing that I've found makes a big difference for me: Exercise. Almost all of my various aches and pains are less pronounced and less debilitating when I'm getting regular exercise.
I think so. I care enormously much. I spent an inordinate amount of time finding a correct keyboard position and chair configuration. I ended up with a GoldTouch adjustable-angle keyboard I found lying around my workplace, plus two books taped together held up by a waterbottle stolen from a coworker to hold up my wrists. Then, I pilfered a sideways mouse that wasn't being used in another part of the office. <p>Nobody else at the company goes quite so far, but the two other main programmers do have Aeron chairs, at least.
The thing I care about most is my keyboard. <p><a href="http://www.microsoft.com/hardware/mouseandkeyboard/productdetails.aspx?pid=043" rel="nofollow">http://www.microsoft.com/hardware/mouseandkeyboard/productde...</a>