Wasn't there a time where there was a proper way of sitting at a computer? Even then, there were warnings on keyboards back in the '90s I remember about ergonomic health or whatever concerning that.
But that's not really a concern these days, not many regard that.
It's still current, with legal force, in the UK for employers providing computers for users to work with. Employers
have to comply with it if they expect people to use computers as part of their jobs (which of course covers a lot of jobs these days).
So for instance, the
actual legislation says:
Interestingly it also says this. I think Microsoft would do well to pay attention to the last bit about software ergonomics; if they get that wrong it would effectively be illegal to use Windows 10 or whatever in the workplace
In designing, selecting, commissioning and modifying software, and in designing tasks using display screen equipment, the employer shall take into account the following principles:
(a)software must be suitable for the task;
(b)software must be easy to use and, where appropriate, adaptable to the level of knowledge or experience of the operator or user; no quantitative or qualitative checking facility may be used without the knowledge of the operators or users;
(c)systems must provide feedback to operators or users on the performance of those systems;
(d)systems must display information in a format and at a pace which are adapted to operators or users;
(e)the principles of software ergonomics must be applied, in particular to human data processing.
Not sure about the rest of the world, but it's gotten out of hand here in the U.S. IMO. Government is too big and too expensive. A bunch of bureaucrats sitting in their offices creating more work for themselves via rules and regulations and employment positions when there's more work load carrying out their rules and regulations. This is how government has gotten to be big. It also stifles commerce.
I'm all for public safety and health, but some of these rules and regulations are simply common sense that should be left to the people themselves. The (a) (b) (c)'s you quoted are absolutely ludicrous . #1. They are common sense. #2. Who is the government to dictate to a business what is right or wrong to use?
I've been in the building industry for 43 years. I've seen code books grow to astronomical sizes. As I've stated, I'm all for public safety and health, but a lot of rules and regulations that have simply gotten out of hand.
i.e. There's a town in our county that made it a rule in their code that two houses next to each other cannot be the same color. (Vinyl siding is used most here in new housing developments.) The building company of that project now does extra work in keeping track of that. Some people are not allowed to have the color they desire. Absolutely ludicrous IMO.
There's so many I'd like to comment on I could write a book. Here's the worse one. We're tornado prone here, especially in the Spring. I had a contract to frame a fairly large apartment complex roughly 10 years ago. They were three story buildings. They were set atop concrete frost walls and concrete slab floors. Code stated that at every outside corner two perforated steel straps were to be installed 16 inches in from the corners and every 12 feet down the wall. The straps were to be nailed every 16 inches to the interior edge of the studs continuously from the 1st floor wall bottom plate to the 3rd floor wall top plate. The 1st floor studs were fastened to the concrete slab with a specialized seismic steel anchor to a 1/2 inch bolt protruding from the slab. 2 lag bolts were used to fasten to the studs. There were approximately 20 straps per building. A lot of cost of material and labor.
Guess what happened? A tornado came through a few years ago. Guess what was left of two buildings? You guessed it. The straps, the studs they were fastened to, and the bottom wall plates. Sadly 3 people lost their lives in those buildings that day. Says a lot for codes and engineering. Common sense tells that perhaps the cost should have gone into a tornado or fallout shelter. Perhaps the three would still be alive. I guess in this instance the government didn't know how powerful a tornado really is.
