You can’t sit there, my IoT desk tells me I don’t know what to do with my arse. Should I be swivelling on it? Should I do it leaning forward with pressure applied to the small of my back? Or would I be better advised to do the business standing up? For various reasons, I am in the market for a standing desk: that is, a desk that you can work at while standing upright …
I broke three vertebrae (and various other bones) in a motorcyle accident when some myopic moron pulled out on me as I passed the junction.
Finding a chair that doesn't leave you seized up after 30 minutes is a serious issue. Some of the best cost £1k+, but most companies won't spend more than £250 and the cheapo ones can be worse than a standard office chair!
I've tried the "kneeling chairs", but I've buggered knees from riding bikes for more than 30years and I can't stand for more than 10 or 15 minutes without my back feeling like I've just been kidney punched.
But I must admit, that GAZE DESK (even if it does have an IoT tag) does look pretty funky. Still, a simple timer to remind you to stand up now and then is all that really needed.
Anyone who has had back issues and sits at a desk for 8-10 hours a day knows that having a decent seat and desk is important.
The flame icon is for the author, not you.
I realize Alasdair is trying to tongue in cheek, however, for those of us IT professionals... its not a laughing matter. (Yes, I've spent time at clients where the working environment was a joke. )
I've always wanted a desk that could be adjusted from seated to standing. I just couldn't justify the price.
My wife had back surgery and I ended up spending $$$ for a desk in her office. She loves it and uses it both sitting and standing. I'm still looking for a new desk and a new chair. My Areon chair is pushing 20 years...
Sorry Dobbs, you're no thought leader and not really that funny. This really isn't a laughing matter.
As to the IOT kickstarter desk... not really a good idea. How does the desk know you're there. What happens if you disappear to head to a meeting? Coffee/Tea break? Lunch?
Imagine if your work buddies hacked your desk? Not cool!
While this seems more like a gimmick, the mechanical desk is not.
Sorry Dobbs, you're no thought leader and not really that funny. This really isn't a laughing matter.
Moping about a problem isn't helping either. I'm with Dabbsie on this one: ridicule the idiocy of imposing "solutions" without researching the specifics. What works for you may not work at all for someone else, and that's what he brings out. BTW, I have a damaged back as well, and I recognise the situation from my days as a consultant where some dumb architect was let loose on the office and replaced the furniture that worked well with a "hot desk" solution which seemed to have been designed to prevent people getting comfortable enough to get any work done.
But I reckon there's no fixing your sense of humour then ..
Ugh. I broke my sacrum/coccyx in a desk related fall actually. I was sliding forward in my chair when it caught on a tile and flipped me forward to land pretty damn square on my butt. I laid there in pain for about 45 minutes.
I went to a doctor who didn't believe me and figured I was just angling for illegal pain pills. I did eventually get him sacked.
My problem with desks is that they're still writing height, not typing height. I have bolted 8" extensions on the legs of my current desk. My keyboard is about an inch above my elbows and any sort of carpal tunnel pain has gone.
I have bolted 8" extensions on the legs of my current desk. My keyboard is about an inch above my elbows and any sort of carpal tunnel pain has gone.
And this is exactly why I nowdays build my home office desks out of kitchen units. They are built to work while standing which makes them by default 5-7cms taller than a normal desk sans legs, add legs to taste for optimal height.
I've tried the "kneeling chairs", but I've buggered knees from riding bikes for more than 30years and I can't stand for more than 10 or 15 minutes without my back feeling like I've just been kidney punched.
I used one as a test, and discovered it was great for my back. The problem was that it also helped me discover that my kneecaps needed work as I couldn't get off it afterwards, so eventually I ended up having surgery for that. Never tried again ..
What about balls? Has anybody tried sitting on them? Does it work for them?
They were all the rage a couple of years ago, so I gave it a try.
On the plus side, if they are the right size (desk height, ratio of torso length to leg length, etc) they are actually nice to sit upon. You can move around on them, wiggle your situpon, even bounce a bit.
On the minus side, you can't move with them like you can with any chairs on wheels. Not that big a problem and somewhat a benefit as it forces you to stand up and walk the few paces to the printer or whatever. But. And this is a big but. You can't lean back. Because there is nothing to lean on to. But you will lean back at some point. Because you're used to it. Because you want to stretch. Because you have to sit through a boring phonecall. Whatever. You will lean back. And you will tumble to the floor in a more or less spectacular way, depending on your level of surprise and physical agility.
I still have that ball (Yes, the other balls as well. I know you, guys.), but now I use it to rest my feet when I sit on the couch.
I used to sit opposite a colleague who used a gym ball as a seat. Hay-fever season was hilarious as he would launch himself backwards onto the floor each time he sneezed. I felt sympathetic for the first week, but when he stuck with (but not on!) the ball after that, I figured it was self inflicted and open to mirth...
Been using one for about 9 months or so now, and have to say it's quite good. You very quickly get used to the fact that it's not as mobile as a regular chair and although you can be all slouchy on it, it's actually not that comfortable to do so. It also encourages you to get up and off it every now and then which is good for you anyway :-)
Only downside is the office clowns who make the same tired fucking joke every time they see you, about wanting to kick the bloody thing out from under you.
Happy bouncy fun time balls go! (we like balls)...
All this IoT stuff is being extensively engineered to replace our own thought processes in the idea that computers can take of day-to-day repetitive stuff without our thinking about it.
The only result of all that is that we will be trained to do as the computer says without thinking about it, because some numpty programmed it that way. Computer says jump, and we will jump.
All this taking care of us is just going to turn us into an entire planet of drooling idiots incapable of critical thought.
Oh, wait, now I get it . . .
"All this IoT stuff is being extensively engineered to replace our own thought processes in the idea that computers can take of day-to-day repetitive stuff without our thinking about it."
Hunter gatherers leave nature to grow things. They don't have to think about more than the most basic storage, they don't have to make plans, and their material needs are met with simple (but skilled) tools and clothing. Early agricultural societies required a lot of planning and organisation, and thinking about the day to day repetitive stuff.
A number of anthropologists believe that the adoption of agriculture was bad for human lifespan, health and intelligence.
Being devil's advocate, perhaps IoT will get us to more like the garden of Eden than the current Cities of the Plain model. Or perhaps it will just enable Facebook to complete the task of world domination.
"A number of anthropologists believe that the adoption of agriculture was bad for human lifespan, health and intelligence."
I'd say that was a pretty bad take on things, and ignores the actual facts in favor of wooly theories. I"m married to an anth major, and she'd no doubt tear them a new one :)
For a person who makes it to 40 years old, if they where a hunter gatherer then they are usually a pretty fine example of humanity. A 40 year old in an early agrarian society often has suffered more disease, injuries, and is generally smaller and usually less skilled (more specific skills, fewer general skills). So far, so much confirmation of initial hypothesis.
However, you get 10-400 times more people making it to 40 in the agrarian society. People survive diseases they otherwise wouldn't, injuries result in changing tasks rather than leading to your demise. A hunter gatherer with a broken leg is usually dead.
There's almost no ability to produce a reliable surplus in hunter gathering, so you can't have any existence of a non-providing class, whereas agriculture allows people to do things other than get food. This is obviously used initially to make things that help make more food, shelter, retaining knowledge, and so on. Then after ten thousand years, some people are going to intellectualize their pastoral fantasies and declare that we where better as noble savages.
Agriculture was bad for an individual (assuming they survived), but is better for a population. Same as urban populations are, on average, less healthy than pastoral ones. But you'd be amazed how many armchair survivalists live in towns and cities.
"Hunter gatherers ... don't have to make plans,"
Hunter gathers have to plan to be in the right place at the right time to hunt or gather what's available at that particular season. There now seems to be archaeological evidence that at least some Mesolithic societies had semi-permanent bases.
Computer says jump, and we will jump.
Only an extension of the philosophy of many large businesses who slavishly follow the recommendations of management consultants, regardless of the ill informed stupidity of taking advice from somebody who doesn't know your business, and will be paid regardless of the probable distraction, cost and failure that comes from listening to consultants.
Years ago I had to relocate my department - which included labs - from one building to another on the same site, and I was project managing the move as well as everything else. My "office" was literally moving from day to day so I could keep an eye on the builders and tradesmen.
The solution was a chair on castors, and a series of large cardboard boxes which would be repurposed to be everything from bookshelves to desk to tables according to what was happening. If the builders bashed into them it didn't matter. The main issue in those days was to remember after every move to make sure reception had the correct extension.
The cardboard boxes for things like aircon units are pretty strong, and by using two of them on either side the middle one can have a knee cutout made without falling over.
... I'd have to put a controller on my chair, to make it automatically follow the desk's height.
Problem solved.
Ilva has a fairly nice, non-smart, electric desk in the same price range as the Refold cardboard thingie. (And with a considerably longer expected life-span.)
Maybe when the 5 year olds of today are grown up, but apart from gadget junkies/tech nerds who actually uses it now?
The only IoT I can think I might possibly need is remote control of the heating, but even then as I'm not a soft sack of shite I'm able to bear a few minutes of a cool house without crying. I certainly don't want my groceries auto-ordered or anything like that,
I can just about see the point of the heating control, and to a very small extent fridges/freezers that can remotely tell you what's in them when you go to the shops, but not enough to want one, buy one, or trust one.
On the subject of office furniture, I used to work with a guy who demanded Microsoft Natural keyboards everywhere he went, and whined like a little girl with a skint knee if he had to use a pleb keyboard like the rest of us. Same guy demanded natural light bulbs (think that was what they were called, he might just have watched a lot of 70s porn and preferred soft focus though, and may also explain any wrist issues caused by keyboards....) so he didn't get migraines.
Even remote control heating, one of the IOT successes, isn't actually that fantastic a plan.
In an old house, a steady temperature is good for preventing damp so it's worth having the heating on low continuously. "Smart" swings of temperature when you enter and leave might end up costing you more in mould treatment than you save in fuel.
In a new house, the insulation is pretty effective. So turning the heat off for a few hours once it's warm doesn't save much fuel because very little was going to be used anyway.
I was an engineering draughtsman for about 30 years, and one thing you cannot do when working at a full size drawing board is sit down. Sure you had a chair, or rather a stool, but that was only for use in the ten minute tea break, or for when you were doing the calculations necessary in the job. The machine shops that you'd come from ran even better. In an area of perhaps 500 men, there'd not be a single chair. So you took your tea break standing up.
Machine Shop & Tea Breaks? That's wot the canteen was for.
In the 'Erection' Shop the only chairs to be found was where a fitter and an apprentice was working on a job. The fitter would sit while (under his instruction) the apprentice did the work. The only time the chair was vacant for more than the time it took to get a cuppa/have a pee was the days when the apprentice was off at the local Tech college doing their C&G's
I was one of the apprentices doing just that from '69 to '72. Then I left and became a Mech Eng Student.
Them was the days.
" ... stand up and sit down with irritating frequency, reminiscent of attending a church service but with less singing ... "
Well, there's an idea - get a pew and alternate between kneeling and sitting.
Titus: "Dave! Sit down! And don't play with the kneely thing!"
Dave: (sitting down) "What kneely th... heeeyy!" (drops out of sight)
I wanted a standing desk at home. But I also wanted to be able to sit at it when I couldn't be arsed standing. I briefly considered an adjustable one before realising I could just have one at standing height and a chair the right height to sit at it comfortably when I wanted. You can over complicate solutions sometimes.
You, sir, are probably a user. What are you doing in this discussion?
As befits techies, most of the solutions have been far more technical than is necessary.
Due to a fail while parking my Beezer bantam many years ago, I stand to work. I'm proud owner of several poser tables. In a delicious irony they're sometimes called poseur tables (Amazon, I'm looking at you). I bought most of my tables from Tesco Bar Hill furniture bit around 2am when they discounted them to £8 each.
If you really need a big desk you can buy an internal (honeycomb) door from Jewson and straddle two tables. You don't need the door handles.
I have a sofa in my office if I feel a lounge coming on.
a split-level desk with telescopic legs controlled by an app that nags you to stand up and sit down with irritating frequency, reminiscent of attending a church service but with less singing.
That's true. I sadly had to attend a Catholic Mass funeral service last month, think my knees were going to give up by the end of it. Quite funny, because the "regulars" were at the back and as most people didn't have a clue what was going on, you kept glancing behind you to see if you should be standing or not.
Not a funeral, but a wedding.
We were all at the back mumbling into our beards (it was a Biker's Wedding), not really happy to be there *and* signing hymns when half-way through another hymn the Vicar moved to the front and said,
"Right. I've had enough. We'll start the hymn again and this time you will all sing!"
Having gone to such a school (we did try the public system, but the three schools in my area wanted to play pass-the-parcel, such was the attitude to Autism in the early 90s).
Stand up, listen to out of tune singing and try to lip-sync, sit down, listen to seemingly endless waffle, kneel, listen to more waffle, sit down, get out of the way of those taking communion… etc.
No, I don't think it did my joints any good either.
...of a sketch by John Finnemore on his Souvenir Programme:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04mgyps 15 mins, 35 seconds in
(transcript of the whole programme here http://j-f-s-p.livejournal.com/5894.html, look for 'Chair Collector', but if you can, listen to the sketch as the delivery of the lines works better)
To paraphrase Marvin: "Here's another of those self-satisfied desks. I can tell it is going to want me to stand up shortly by the intolerable air of smugness it suddenly generates."
Doffs hat (roo leather Barmah today, it's pissing down again) to the late, great Douglas Adams
I thought "Oh neat, a folding desk. Not a bad idea for pop up locations".
Then I saw the price. US$250 !!!??? WTF? For a bit of cardboard?
My boss is, right at this minute using one of these as a riser to stand at his desk. Took 3 minutes assemble, and another 3 minutes to shuffle his crap and sort his cables out.
That is all you need to spend.
The dimensions are just right to accommodate a 19" rackmount device between the legs. Unfortunately the current version has been cheaped down to a level that you can only screw a single 1U device in; just the top inch (0.18 linguine) and the bottom half inch (0.09 linguine) are from a material that can, with not too much stretching of the term, be called solid; the remaining parts of the legs are stiff paper on the outside with a stiff paper honeycomb filling, with the paint layer making a significant contribution to the load bearing properties. But it'll do for a rackmount network or KVM switch, or storage unit (may require an additional bracket on the rear, because of the weight)
Try, there is no PC, no phone and no desk. I wonder what the BOFH would do?
Another company, you'll have to move to this desk where there is no network port but we do have wi-fi only it will take half a day to get the login details. Nevermind by then your laptop battery will be dead as there are no power sockets anywhere near.
I swear to to the chairmaker above, half the companies in this country are funded by people with too much money and managed by people who think that employees aren't challenged enough by creating and selling products and services and need extra obstacles deliberately introduced so that employees don't get time to change any of 'the good old ways around here'.
A hanging desk? The type that is attached to cables spun from the floor to the ceiling, and have the stability of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge when the nor'easter picks up 50 knots.
I'm still waiting for some intrepid upstart to conjure up a waterdesk - one that uses the capillary pressure of dihydrogen monoxide to elevate your work surface while also providing hot water for your tea and a bong funnel, with coloured lights and robot fishies inside.
Personally I prefer a desk that doesn't stand, since I have no "top" or "plasma" to stand on any such contraption - it's lotus all the way, 15 incher snugly resting on my knees, drink to the left of me, ashtray to the right, here I am, stuck in front of the TV.*)
*) special thanks to The Woz for making userfriendly computing happen, Stealers Wheel for figuring out the circus and The Honorable Monsignor Aldasaur Dubs Esq. for providing well-received ammo.
I was in the market for a desk that could be raised or lowered recently.
IKEA actually do a few models which are really good for the price compared to competing desk companies (dirt cheap in comparison actually).
So, I work from home a lot and having one of these desks is a godsend.
Seems to be a bit silly to have a IoT desk that tells you when you should stand up where you could have, I don't know, an alarm clock that goes off so you know when you should stand, it's cheaper, already available and not so annoying!
Alistair, if you really work with your keyboard in that position then I suspect you'll get upper-back problems from constantly leaning forward or stretching your arms to reach it. Been there, done that, and now my keyboard has to be as near to me as my gut will allow.
(Nice desktop accessories though - even got the traditional cut-and-paste tools)
Crikey, that leather-substitute topped desk looks like Inspector Clouseau has been playing billiards on it.
What a load of drivel stand-up desks are. I've worked in IT for over 35 years and can say without fear of knowledgeable contradiction that the desks are fine the way they are. What's needed is a new concept in chairs.
I envisage a Davros-like thing with integral karzi, wifi and Keurig. No more need one break train of thought with inconvenient trips to the bog or coffee machine (which in all likelihood will have only half-burned dregs in it because I'm the only bugger in this place who can fathom the workings of the drip coffee maker, a machine only marginally more complicated than the wheel for fuck's sake and what that says about the code you buggers are turning put doesn't bear thinking about).
What was the question?
I've done some of my best problem solving while seated on the bog. Serious thinking frequently needs some form of displacement activity. It keeps the reptile brain occupied stopping it from interrupting with the neurological equivalent of "are we there yet?"
I hear you about the coffee machine. WTF is wrong with people? Sadly the solution is to throw the bloody thing out and replace it with a far more expensive and complex capsule machine. Just remember to hide the milk heater thing 'cause the feckers won't rinse it. Or just drink your coffee black.
Not sure about the rest of the idiocy of a no-doubt quite expensive (shush, a mere $150 USD) cardboard box.
But their website can't be arsed to display anything until you enable Javascript. And even then their actual website is 2 levels down in the scripts-that-get-loaded-by-another script, the bane (and justification) of NoScript.
Odd that, for a hipster tech outfit, they've never heard of graceful degradation and they may just get on the nerves of their target demographic.
Sure got on my nerves.
So bad it's almost a spoof: "Low level stands are sold separately"... "Spillproof top sold separately"... "Only weighs 6.5kg"... (how will it balance on a micro scooter)?
The height looks way too low - you have to crane your neck down or stoop down, and hold your wrists at the wrong angle to use it.
Oh and the top can be seen bending while the guy is standing on it.
My work from home setup when I don't get kicked out of this chair: http://www.houzz.com/photos/8940076/Berkley-Outdoor-Swinging-Egg-Chair-contemporary-hammocks-and-swing-chairs
is to stand up in front of a 5 tier chest of drawers, just high enough to comfortably type on.
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