In every flight I've been on lately, I've walked past a middle-age man in first class unconsciously wincing as he laboriously typing an email on his iPad with no keyboard...
So, sure the article is a fine general summary of physiological/"ergonomic" principles. But, having a bit of training in body work and movement, I have to say that many people are simply unable to notice debilitating situations until those situations are truly injuring them and then it is often too late - at least too late for a small change in routine to be enough.
So initial advice like asking one's self "do certain tasks or pieces of furniture and equipment stand out as awkward, difficult, even painful to use" are really less useful than they ought to be.
... Which is to say that having some detailed page on ergonomics doesn't make up for Apple's products flagrantly violating ergonomic principles - especially, Apple de-emphasizing the keyboard is bad regardless of their offering alternatives if you look really, really hard. The iPad is a further ergonomic disaster regardless of the fact "most people only use it a little" and "you can attach a keyboard to".
Using a pointing device for input is a disaster compared to a keyboard because it inherently involved more shock-per-byte-enter to the member involved than using a keyboard. Anyone concerned about ergonomics should stop doing that before they notice problems, not afterwards - which is not to say that people can't have other, serious problems around the other issues mentioned in the articles other sections.
Good ergonomics should not be about changing things once people a problem.
It's always seemed to me that Apple's view of their users is simply that they do very little actual typing- and they will be doing less and less as time progresses.
It doesn't really even seem like that inaccurate of a view. It is exceedingly rare I see any real typing happening on an Apple keyboard. Usually the most use I see them receiving, is the typing of a paper- at about 3wpm.
* typing either with a physical keyboard OR with an on-screen keyboard
In every flight I've been on lately, I've walked past a middle-age man in first class unconsciously wincing as he laboriously typing an email on his iPad with no keyboard...
So, sure the article is a fine general summary of physiological/"ergonomic" principles. But, having a bit of training in body work and movement, I have to say that many people are simply unable to notice debilitating situations until those situations are truly injuring them and then it is often too late - at least too late for a small change in routine to be enough.
So initial advice like asking one's self "do certain tasks or pieces of furniture and equipment stand out as awkward, difficult, even painful to use" are really less useful than they ought to be.
... Which is to say that having some detailed page on ergonomics doesn't make up for Apple's products flagrantly violating ergonomic principles - especially, Apple de-emphasizing the keyboard is bad regardless of their offering alternatives if you look really, really hard. The iPad is a further ergonomic disaster regardless of the fact "most people only use it a little" and "you can attach a keyboard to".
Using a pointing device for input is a disaster compared to a keyboard because it inherently involved more shock-per-byte-enter to the member involved than using a keyboard. Anyone concerned about ergonomics should stop doing that before they notice problems, not afterwards - which is not to say that people can't have other, serious problems around the other issues mentioned in the articles other sections.
Good ergonomics should not be about changing things once people a problem.