Workrave breakreminder preview

Preview of the break reminding program Workrave which help reducing the eye strain.

Here we go now. I'll make a comparison of break reminding software like Workrave, eye defender and so on.
The first one is Workrave. This program is good because of the different exercises it offers. But let go step by step.

The first thing it offer is the micro-breaks.

Micro-break

The micro-breaks are small pop-up windows that shows every few minutes for a short time. If you have heard about the 20-20-20 rule this is something similar. If your eyes focus at the same distance for a long time i.e. the monitor, your eyes get tired and this lead to eye strain. So looking away from the monitor or just stopping your work to get a little rest is good and healthy for you and your eyes.



Go to the preferences menu and there on the Micro-break tab
 you can adjust the time of your micro-breaks.

Micro-break settings

The time between breaks by default is 3 mins. If this is too often for you set it to higher

Break duration is the time that the break lasts. I think that the default time of 30 seconds is good. There is no need to be bigger and even if you set it to 20s it still do the job.

The postpone time is a option to postpone the break for later if you have something important to do. The default time is 2:30 min but i think that 1 min is good

You can un-check the show postpone button and Skip  button options if the computer is used by children and you want to be sure that they will follow the breaks and not damage their eyes from staring at the monitor.

And un-check Prompt before breaking or otherwise a annoying small window shows up before the break reminders...(personal opinion).


On the Rest break tab you can adjust the time of the big breaks
with exercises against eye strain and repetitive strain injury.

Rest break settings

The settings are similar to those of the micro breaks. Again un-check the Prompt before breaking.

Change the number of exercises to such that fits your needs. Try few times and you will figure it out.














And last click the user interface icon (the monitor under the clock in the top left corner)
and choose to block or not the mouse input.

Block input settings

Choose Block input or No blocking to allow normal work even if the micro or rest break has pop up.
Or even Block input and screen if you kids are using it.

The second thing are the Exercises.

First of the exercises against eye strain. You have to focus at objects at different distances in order to remove the strain from your eyes and the muscles responsible for the eye focus.

Focus at objects at different distance.

The second from the eye exercises is the "Look in to the darkness" exercise. It gives better relief to your eyes that just closing them, since still there is no object to focus on. And there is no light to your retina.

Cover your eyes

The third eye exercise is looking at different directions. You have to look at monitor corners and follow the monitor edge to the next corner. This is to make your eye balls move and not just stare in front of you.

Look at monitor edges.

The other exercises are against RSI or repetitive strain injury. Or in other words to "stretch your bones". Sitting at one place and doing the same things and moving its not very healthy so these simple and well known exercises are good to follow. And after long time spent in the same position some people complain about pain in the neck, headaches and so on. This is the list of the exercises.

Finger stretch

Shoulder stretch

Move shoulders 

Backward shoulder stretch

Turn head

Neck stretch

I have put all the pictures of the exercises and the micro-breaks and settings to give everyone idea what to do and how to prevent eye strain and RSI. Even if you are not using such program try to remember to make breaks often even short ones. Try to get bigger breaks once in a while and also make some simple exercises even if they are different from the shown above.

Break reminders and eye exercises in work environment.

Eye exercises in work environment

In the previous article I suggested using a breaks and exercises to reduce and prevent the eye strain and dry eyes symptoms. A very handy tool in this case are the break reminder programs.
The break reminder programs like eye defender are good but sometimes in work environment it's not very appropriate to have different images or pop-screens on your computer. There is a list of such kind of software on Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_repetitive_strain_injury_software (the table at the bottom of the page). Like you can see there are many choices.
While program such as Workrave is good since it's offers short micro breaks and program with exercises which are very helpful not only for dry eyes but for removing pain in the neck and the back. It's not always appropriate to have it on your work computer. I prefer to use eyedefender program by selecting "show a popup balloon in system tray"

A small popup balloon show up for few seconds and then fade out. It's enough to remind you to move you eyes away from the screen.










You can set the interval between the breaks at few minutes and just make some small simple exercises.
There are few exercises which are simple and can be used without problems on work:

1. Focus your eyes at distant object 

Blink few times and focus your eyes at the furthest object behind your monitor or somewhere else in the room, or in the window.
Now there are two option for this exercise. 

 - just look at the objects far away - the simplest exercise offers a good rest for your eye muscles and removing the eye strain. Keep blinking meanwhile to keep your eyes wet and to relieve the dry eyes.

 - look at object far away for few seconds, then look at object at close distance for few seconds, repeat few times. You can blink during the exercise.

2. Move your eyes at the monitor edge

Blink few times. Look at the monitor top right corner. Follow slowly with eyes the edge of the monitor until you reach the top left corner. Then again slowly follow the edge to the bottom left corner ... follow the edges until you make a full circle. Repeat it few times changing the direction from left to right.

3. Look in the darkness

This exercise actually is not always appropriate but its simple and offer good rest.

This is screenshot from Workrave program.
It explain very well what to do. Just cover your eyes with hands and look in the dark. This is simple exercise that offer just a rest for the eyes. Do it for 20 seconds.