Gnome Typing Break

As I've said in an older post, I wasn't that impressed with the latest Ubuntu but I also couldn't install OpenSolaris on a laptop. So I installed Ubuntu 6.06 LTS, which seems to work quite nicely. I even has suspend to RAM working (though it breaks the sound afterwards).

One nice feature Gnome has that I didn't know of it is Typing Break, found in System -> Preferences -> Keyboard.


It basically forces you to take a break after a period of time. Gets useful after you start getting some hand-aches. During the break you see something like this:



It takes a bit of discipline to actually respect the breaks (especially when something is urgent and you have the "Postpone" button -- which should be renamed to Snooze). Then again, even if I disable the postpone button I might be tempted to Ctrl+Alt+Backspace or Ctrl+Alt+F1, login then kill process.

I'm also looking at some exotic and ergo- keyboards lately. Anyone has something to recommend ?

I would really like something like 2 half-keyboards. One for each hand, then going into the USB port. This way I can place them to the right and left side of the laptop and use them quite nicely -- it's almost impossible to use an external keyboard with a laptop without also adding an external display.

OK, no flying cars. But 2007 and no mind-reading input devices ? Someone is slacking off...