The takeaway from this article should be to consider modifying your tools to your needs even in unconventional and controversial ways. I love it.
The flame war on whether the original chassis design sucks or rocks is not that interesting.
The takeaway from this article should be to consider modifying your tools to your needs even in unconventional and controversial ways. I love it.
The flame war on whether the original chassis design sucks or rocks is not that interesting.
25 years ago one of early engineering courses included a case study about Ingersol Rand (IIRC). They went out to work floors and saw how all the workers had modified their air wrenches in the same way, adding padding with tape in various areas. They realized they could probably make a better wrench if it had some of those ergonomics built in.
Maybe the next phase of Apple could return to flowing shapes and save our wrists.
> save our wrists
If your wrist is in contact with the edge of the laptop while you are actively typing, then your typing style has a good chance of giving you RSI. You'd be better off trying to fix that than trying to make the fast path to RSI more convenient.
How the f are you supposed to type? Ideally I'd like full support for my arms from the elbow to the wrist.
In my first job - i think it was in 1997, I had my own small room with an L-shaped desk with a rounded corner. That gave a few inches of space for resting my arms - both when typing on a quite reasonable Pentium laptop, and especially when using the mouse.
Since then, the desks and the chairs has become shittier and shittier. Except perhaps when a was a consultant for an HR-department.
The U-shaped desk was probably the best ergonomically designed workplace I've had. Maybe a wheat-filled pad along the desk would have made it better.
Like a person playing the piano.
If your arms are resting, then your fingers and wrists are doing the maximum amount of reaching as you type. If you use a wrist rest you are encouraging your fingers/wrist to reach up (bend in your wrist) instead of neutral or reaching down (more natural position).
Straight wrists is good, but hovering like a pianist is not good for extended computer use.
A more concrete way of putting it is if you are putting so much weight on your wrists that the edge of the MacBook is making you uncomfortable, you're probably doing it wrong.
If your comments on HN end with "you are probably doing it wrong", you are probably doing empathy wrong.
Steve Jobs back from the dead?
I've heard this but I've personally been typing this way for 25+ years (wrists on the rest, including on laptops exclusively for the last 15) and my wrists are fine. Meanwhile people I know with ergonomic keyboards and everything that's supposed to save your wrists are the ones with bad wrists.
The reasonable takeaway from that correlation is that people with preexisting issues turn to ergonomic keyboards to avoid worsening those issues, not the other way round.
Too bad even the ergo desktop keyboards don't handle this properly
Interchangeable wrist area as an accessory for only 79.99$
Interchangeable? No, $250 upgrade, fused with the case at the factory and somehow electronically serialized
One time cost? This should be a subscription that raises spikes when you don't pay
The Apple way for hardware is more to design the thing so it breaks under normal use very quickly, and then refuse to replace it under warranty.
My experience with Apple hardware has been it generally holds up. I've only on my third iPad since I bought the original in 2011. My iPhones have all lasted at least four years.
The screen on my Macbook Air has been the exception. I wonder why they can't just use the same display on those that they do iPad. Seems better quality, as well
Per side.
Note: Left hand wrist areas are currently out of stock.
The right hand wrist area is the best we have ever made though.
The interesting part isn't whether Apple got the design right or wrong, it's that most of us never even consider altering the tools we use every day. We just adapt ourselves instead.
And commonly get judgy and weird if somone thinks and does.
When I got into photography, I used to baby my camera equipment a lot. After all, I spent a lot of money I wanted to take care of it.
Later on the topic came up online and someone noted something to the effective of:
“If I saw a group of photographers taking pictures, I bet I could pick out the best photographer just based on how beat up their equipment is.”
I realized based on my own experience, that was probably true.
The idea being use your tools and worry about the output, not how they look.
I’ve made my living as a pro photographer for over 30 years. These days I consider most cameras to be disposable. I also keep any older bodies as hazardous duty remote cameras. Once you get into the mindset it opens a certain amount of creativity.
The number of times I find myself saying to beginning photographers that babying their camera is the surest way to hate photography, whether as a hobby or a profession… I get particularly testy about handwringing about weather sealing or protecting the finish on their kit. Just take the camera places and use it. It’s probably going to be fine. It’s going to get scars. That’s just stories.
I really like the design and the sharp edges don’t hurt my wrists.
I also really like this article and am 100% supportive of people messing around and modifying their stuff.
The funny thing is Apple products are considered “finished products” No one would feel the same way if it was a home built computer.
The modding community is a shadow of its old self these days
That doesn’t seem strange to me, Apple is my “buy it for what’s on the box” brand, stuff that I don’t want to mod. If I want to mess with something I usually use hardware that runs Linux.
This is why I like cheaper tools. Yes, that means cheaper quality but it's far easier to approach taking a dremel to it. And the DIY look usually matches the stock materials better anyway.
Nah, taking the risk is even more fun when the thing you're modifying holds more value.
Chopping the fenders on a Porsche 911 to install a widebody kit does not have the same weight as rolling the seams on an Jeep Cherokee.
All things being equal, sure, but I personally am way more likely to mod the Cherokee than the Porsche
I'd say it's an even split. Half the Jeeps on the road and on the trails are modified. On the road maybe 1/10 of Porches are modified, but on the track 90% are.
Big difference between bolt-ons vs deeper mods too.
> The takeaway from this article should be to consider modifying your tools to your needs even in unconventional and controversial ways. I love it.
I get the feeling that might not be the greatest idea in some fields.
For example, anything that could kill you (or others) if it goes wrong. ;)
Yeah, I think it's pretty funny. And it is good to modify your own tools. In a way that's the whole sentiment of FOSS software.