Got QWERTY? How Are Those Thumbs Feeling?

[Ed Hansberry]

<a href="http://www.breitbart.com/news/2005/10/20/D8DC4N8O0.html">http://www.breitbart.com/news/2005/10/20/D8DC4N8O0.html</a><br /><br /><i>"Chris Claypool was addicted to his BlackBerry wireless handheld. Like many users, he never thought twice about pecking away at lightning speed, replying to a wave of e-mails from clients around the globe. Last year, the 37-year-old agricultural sales director from Post Falls, Idaho, noticed a throbbing sensation in this thumbs whenever he typed. He switched to tapping with his index finger, then his middle digit and finally his pinky. But his thumbs pained him to the point where he can't even press the buttons on his TV remote control. After months of aching, Claypool took a break. Now he only uses his BlackBerry to send short messages _ typing with the tip of a pencil eraser whenever his thumbs get sore."</i><br /><br />Ouch. I have one word for you. <a href="http://www.textware.com">FITALY</a> Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know. Third party and all of that. However, I am at over 40wpm with FITALY and have been using it since 2000 with nary a sign of carpal tunnel syndrome. I've never heard of anyone getting carpal tunnel from using a pencil and don't see how using a stylus is much different. The only bad thing about popup keyboards is they take up way too much screen real estate on square screens, so using it on a Treo 700w or the HP Messenger series would be less than ideal. What about those of you with QWERTY keyboard devices. Notice any pain or do any exercises to prevent problems?

[Jerry Raia]

I type so slow I doubt I could ever hurt myself! :lol:

[Pdaholic]

Wow, this is lame. I've been using thumboard based PDAs for 3-4 years now (Revo->TG50->NX70->UX50->4350->Jasjar) and my thumbs are just fine.

May I coin a new phrase?

"METACARPAL THUMBOARD SYNDROME"

:devilboy:

[bdegroodt]

Guilty! I can attest to this as a real problem. But, I can also say without a doubt the comments by the "industry" about frequency are valid. After about 6 months of responding to somewhere around 150-200 emails a day (I was on the road 5 days a week) I started to get real weird tingle/sharp pains on the edges of my thumbs where I made contact with the thumb-board. It usually cleared up after about 24 hours of no use, but it was a genuine problem for me, but I wouldn't call my use of the BBerry "average" by any means.

[adamz]

I only just got my first Pocket PC with thumboard. I'm craving craving craving a release of Fitaly that I can install which won't screw things up. In other words, a Windows Mobile 5 version. I've had to reformat a few times due to Fitaly related problems.

Unfortunately, the Fitaly people don't respond to emails about problems or future release date requests.

[ctmagnus]

fwiw, when using thumbboards, you're not supposed to type with your thumbs; you're supposed to type with the fingers of one hand. I've got a scan from a newspaper somewhere with all that kind of info in it. I'll see if I can find it and then I'll post it for all you keyboard-enabled device folks.

[ctmagnus]

... check my media file: http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/assets/common/FileObject/gif.gif Preventing%20injuries.gif (http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/media/users/3482/Preventing%20injuries.gif) (Size: 68.5 KB)
It's cool, isn't it?

[bdegroodt]

... check my media file: http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/assets/common/FileObject/gif.gif Preventing%20injuries.gif (http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/media/users/3482/Preventing%20injuries.gif) (Size: 68.5 KB)
It's cool, isn't it?
Absurd. If that really was the intended way to use these devices there wouldn't be any logic in making them QWERTY (optimized for 2 handed input).

[caubeck]

The logic of using QWERTY in most modern keyboards - even tiny virtual ones - is to allow people to locate the letters quickly, following the age-old pattern they know so well. Whether they use one or two hands, or one or two fingers, in neither here nor there. The QWERTY keyboard was originally designed to slow typists down, not optimise speed, so everything we achieve by learning the layout requires a certain rebellion against the system anyway.

The terms "thumb board" and "lap top" shouldn't be taken too literally. Manufacturers are not doctors.

[Pdaholic]

The QWERTY keyboard was originally designed to slow typists down, not optimise speed, so everything we achieve by learning the layout requires a certain rebellion against the system anyway.

Not that it really matters, but the reason why QWERTY was invented was so that the letters on a typebar didn't collide and get stuck. I think the guy's name was Sholes that invented it, and the incidence of typebar malfunction was supposedly reduced with this new fangled letter system.

[caubeck]

Yes, commonly paired keys (such as the Q and U) were separated so the mechanical arms wouldn't jam when the typist worked too quickly. This encouraged trained typists to use both hands rather than press both keys in quick succession with the same fingers. Memory rather than sight and two wrist movements instead of one.

Practically every improvement on keyboard layout to make the job faster (now that we don't need to worry about the mechanism jamming) has been abandoned or ignored, but if a keyboard were ever designed especially for thumbs and mobile equipment the logical thing would be to remap the positions of the keys. The Q and U would be placed on a single button, perhaps with others made for common suffixes. The problem would be that not every language has the same spread of letter frequency and it would be a manufacturer's nightmare to provide each language with its own keyboard. Our current QWERTY design makes no sense to a Spanish user, for example, where the V and B (two of the most commonly confused letters) are found together in the bottom row. Of course, Spaniards learn to get over it when they train.

Anyway, QWERTY was invented for a reason that no longer exists and the same amount of thought should be given to positioning keys better for thumbs on a mobile unit, but making sure medical device is taken into account.