OSDev.org

Posted: **Thu Sep 16, 2021 1:30 am**

DavidCooper wrote:I've just read something that says you can get DVT from standing too. A walking desk is a better solution, though it would me more environmentally friendly to be able to walk around while programming, and that means wearable computers. I hope we don't have to wait much longer before we have those.

You can make your own. People have been experimenting with wearable computing since the 90s. I almost but not quite got into it myself. It's mostly home-made, but there's a few bits of commercial stuff. With minituarization, 3D printing, and powerful but tiny electronic devices, there are more options for making it look decent than ever before.

A few years ago, I bought a Tekgear Twiddler handheld keyboard for a different ergonomic health issue. Learning to use it went better than expected, but it did take time. Alphabet, numbers, and symbols were separate stages of learning. Unfortunately it makes my fingers ache; as small as it is, curling my fingers across that range hurts. It's partly because my fingers are very different lengths; I concluded hand-held keyboards should be tailored to each user. I have considered making my own hand-held keyboard, but was too ill to really do it. Incidentally, you want to make keys register on key-release rather than key-press because it's impossible to press all the keys precisely together.

Display is an issue. Handheld screens such as phones and tablets are ergonomic horrors; I really don't recommend them. If you have to use one, you'll want a lightweight screen and that means a small one. Perhaps the biggest part of the weight is the glass, so a screen with a resistive touchscreen or none at all might be a better bet. A small-tipped stylus (which is necessary with a resistive touchscreen) is a vastly superior pointing device to even the most delicate finger, anyway.

Without seriously toughened glass, you probably do want something to protect the screen. My Palm m515 once survived having a bike dropped onto it; a heavy bike with extra-spikey pedals right onto the screen side while protected only by the thinnest trousers I've ever owned, (nearly killed my leg!) but that must have been a fluke. My first Zaurus screen was cracked simply by getting out of a car with my keys in the same pocket.

But that's assuming a handheld screen. I have wondered if Google Glass units are hackable, but in my case it wouldn't be compatible with my glasses. Contact lenses are great for my eyesight, but too much hassle. I've also thought of projecting a screen image onto the curvature of my glasses, but I can't work out the optics and I don't know where I'd mount it anyway. It might be quite easy to make a neat opaque one-eye HUD these days; a smooth mirror 'lens' with a tiny projector from the side. Some people have used military HUDs, but my opinion on wearing them is just no!

I suppose you could spray one copper-color and put together a full steampunk outfit, but I find full steampunk outfits are just too much hassle. My other issue with HUDs is I like show a friendly face, hence the transparent HUDs being my first choices.

Edit #935: Instead of a screen, audio is an option. It is a bit tricky because it's 1D instead of 2D; you need to use your memory, but I knew a blind chap once; he got on all right. He had a Z180-based computer with a virtual 80x25 character display, and I think that could read out lines and paragraphs. His PC could do stuff like read back what he just typed. I haven't really tried modern screen reader software myself, but I see the potential. Ethin might have something to say about this.

One idea I had was not really wearable, but somewhat better than a phone or tablet. It would be a chording keyboard held in both hands, with a screen folding up and perhaps extending on a telescoping arm. I have an unusual old remote control which is about right to be cradled between my hands and worked as a chording keyboard with only my thumbs. With each of my thumbs pressing up to 2 buttons and not crossing the center, I could get over 300 key-combinations with relatively few buttons. It's also good in that the buttons face toward you; the Twiddler's buttons face away from you and if you turn it around to look at it, you have to mirror the layout in your head. I wanted to build this with that old remote and an old phone which has a jewel-like laquered red finish and is still in perfect condition, but the phone is a bit heavy to be mounted on the end of a telescoping arm and the remote's keys are perished; they feel awful. It would be better to have just a plastic screen on the arm and perhaps a wider body to grip.

But having written all that about wearables, I don't understand how they would be more environmentally friendly. Surely, you could generate power with the treadmill of a walking desk.

DavidCooper wrote:By the way, the problem that I've had with sitting down for even short lengths of time also appears to be diminishing a bit now just by taking Aspirin, so I may be able to avoid going on anything stronger if this progress continues. This was not the normal kind of DVT with one big blood clot reaching the lungs, but a "pulmonary embolism shower" of small clots.

I'm glad you're getting better.

I'm already feeling better from my diabetes with just a little care for my diet. But speaking of diet, I need to stop typing and eat. (I shouldn't have rushed the post.)

Edit: I forgot to note my thoughts on programming with a small screen. I didn't find any really wonderful ideas, only trying to figure out how various languages would work with flowing text because that gets more on the screen. I think Forth could work quite well if the start of each definition is colorized. "Plain English" obviously could, although its authors prefer one sentence per line. Oh huh... now I remember your machine code editor already makes maximal use of the screen, David.

Posted: **Thu Sep 16, 2021 3:34 am**

eekee wrote: I'm glad you're getting better. I'm already feeling better from my diabetes with just a little care for my diet. But speaking of diet, I need to stop typing and eat. (I shouldn't have rushed the post.)

I don't know which type of diabetes you suffer from, but I read a paper a while ago about long term studies that have shown that a hardcore diet of 800 calories a day for eight weeks would reverse the state of the pancreas and "cure" diabetes (or close to it). It's not applicable to type 1 diabetes, so ask your doctor about this.

Notice: this is not medical advice, it's a suggestion to consult your doctor and talk to them about it. They'll have the information at their disposal and will advise you properly afterwards. You might ask "if it was applicable to me, wouldn't the doctor have said something already?" Well, doctors are human and can't know everything and read every single scientific article published, but will (usually) know how to act when faced with additional information in their diagnosis and treatment plan. Never self-medicate, but don't be afraid to mention to your doctor information that has not been discussed earlier, because at most they'll tell you it's not applicable, at best it may save your life.

Posted: **Thu Sep 16, 2021 4:34 pm**

eekee wrote:Display is an issue.

I'm surprised there still isn't something simple that lets you flip down a lens and mirror in front of one or both eyes with the screen(s) kept horizontal - this could then become the screen for all your cameras, phones, computers and TVs, although you'd have to have some alternative way of doing touch. Ideally it would also have a camera on it to show the view ahead so that you can merge the two inputs and see your computer screen semi-transparent with the world ahead of you also visible. The technology needed for this has been around in video camera viewfinders for decades.

Instead of a screen, audio is an option.

It would be good if we could get together some binary blobs that people can add to their operating systems to provide basic speech synthesis compactly and some form of speech recognition that could at least replicate keyboard input without the keyboard. I've recently had a go at speech synthesis using JavaScript and Web Audio where I built all the vowels needed for English out of ten sine waves on the harmonic sequence, plus sounds like s and sh using modified sine waves with randomly adjusted frequency, as well as click consonants where there's a silence followed by a very short fricative or sibilant. This leads to very compact code, although you obviously need something like HD Audio too (which again could potentially be put together as a binary blob).

But having written all that about wearables, I don't understand how they would be more environmentally friendly. Surely, you could generate power with the treadmill of a walking desk.

I assumed they were all powered. If some aren't and it's still practical to type while using them, then that that would solve my immediate problem. I'd like to be able to try one before buying it though as sending things back is really awkward.

I'm glad you're getting better. I'm already feeling better from my diabetes with just a little care for my diet.

Thanks, and I wish you the best with your health issue too.

Edit: I forgot to note my thoughts on programming with a small screen. I didn't find any really wonderful ideas, only trying to figure out how various languages would work with flowing text because that gets more on the screen. I think Forth could work quite well if the start of each definition is colorized. "Plain English" obviously could, although its authors prefer one sentence per line. Oh huh... now I remember your machine code editor already makes maximal use of the screen, David.

You can manage surprisingly well with very little screen. One of my recent projects is a JavaScript keyboard program and text editor for multilingual input, but I've also built a JavaScript layout for writing code in a similar way to the ZX Spectrum (whole word per key, or entire template programs and functions). I've attached a photo of it. The small part of the screen used to display the program you write with it is big enough to do the job, although it's a lot more comfortable to use the whole screen when trying to find your way around it. (I use the virtual hexagon keyboard in combination with the physical keyboard as a way of reducing repetitive strain injury issues.)

Code: Select all

   function cheep(){
var context = new AudioContext(); o=context.createOscillator();
g=context.createGain(); o.type = "sine"; o.frequency.value=5000;
o.connect(g); g.connect(context.destination); g.gain.value=0.1;
o.frequency.setValueAtTime(5000,0); o.frequency.linearRampToValueAtTime(6000,0.02); 
o.frequency.setValueAtTime(5100,0.02); o.frequency.linearRampToValueAtTime(5000,0.04); 
o.frequency.setValueAtTime(5000,0.04); o.frequency.linearRampToValueAtTime(4900,0.06); 
o.frequency.setValueAtTime(5100,0.06); o.frequency.linearRampToValueAtTime(5600,0.08); 
o.frequency.setValueAtTime(5000,0.08); o.frequency.linearRampToValueAtTime(6500,0.1); 
o.frequency.setValueAtTime(5100,0.1); o.frequency.linearRampToValueAtTime(4500,0.12); 
o.start(0); o.stop(0.12);
   }

If anyone wants to have a go at web audio, just stick that in a JavaScript program and call it from a button.

Posted: **Fri Sep 17, 2021 10:48 am**

BigBuda wrote: I don't know which type of diabetes you suffer from, but I read a paper a while ago about long term studies that have shown that a hardcore diet of 800 calories a day for eight weeks would reverse the state of the pancreas and cure diabetes (or close to it).

Hey, not trying to give you a hard time here, but I saw this and felt compelled to add a warning just in case. With type 1 diabetes a very low calorie diet can be extremely dangerous. If you have type 2 diabetes due to obesity then it can indeed reduce or resolve the symptoms though. If anyone is interested in following this advice, please talk to your doctor and be careful as changes to diet can definitely trigger life threatening complications in people with diabetes.

Posted: **Fri Sep 17, 2021 12:57 pm**

StudlyCaps wrote:Hey, not trying to give you a hard time here, but I saw this and felt compelled to add a warning just in case. With type 1 diabetes a very low calorie diet can be extremely dangerous. If you have type 2 diabetes due to obesity then it can indeed reduce or resolve the symptoms though. If anyone is interested in following this advice, please talk to your doctor and be careful as changes to diet can definitely trigger life threatening complications in people with diabetes.

Exactly right, that's why I specifically mentioned that it depends on the type of diabetes (although with a poor choice of words due to not being my native language). I mentioned it as a reference so that eekee would research further and ask the doctor about it to find out if it applies, not as medical advice. I am assuming people in this forum have above average intellect and common sense in order to not blindly and literally follow medical related suggestions without further consultation.

Posted: **Sat Sep 18, 2021 12:10 am**

@DavidCooper: Interesting! I'll have to reply in another post. I was going to start another thread for diabetes, but thought I'd better post this here.

On diabetes:

@StudlyCaps: Thank you

BigBuda wrote:I don't know which type of diabetes you suffer from, but I read a paper a while ago about long term studies that have shown that a hardcore diet of 800 calories a day for eight weeks would reverse the state of the pancreas and cure diabetes (or close to it).

Thank you, but I do suggest editing your post with a medical warning because we do, surprisingly, get some people here who definitely have below average intelligence. I find my intelligence at any given moment varies widely, presumably with my blood sugar level or something, and some aspects of programming hardly require any intelligence at all. Intelligence is really required to process unfamiliar things, both to take in new data and to recognize that concepts may not be as simple and easy as they appear. (Actually, recognition of anything unexpected may be difficult.) Perhaps you can see how these issues apply to medical matters, especially for people who may be a little desperate. Giving suggestions is a surprisingly tricky field. (I hope this is understandable to a non-native speaker. No insult is intended. I don't really find communication as easy as I may appear to.)

But regardless of the danger, thank you for the detail. I've heard of the diet before, but had no calorie figure to associate with it. There is a danger even for the right type of diabetes: 800 calories is below the minimum 1000 recommended for adults, so you have to be careful. When I last heard of this diet, it was to be done only under a doctor's supervision. Perhaps time and experience has shown it can be implemented by individuals but, having experience with low blood sugar and its effect on the mind, I wouldn't do it unless I lived with someone who has a clear mind and understands the diet. And honestly, I'd take that someone with me when discussing it with a doctor.

Posted: **Sat Sep 18, 2021 1:32 am**

Already done. I keep forgetting that this is a forum and not a chat, from being so used to it, not allowing for real-time expansion on the subject.

eekee wrote:Thank you, but I do suggest editing your post with a medical warning because we do, surprisingly, get some people here who definitely have below average intelligence.

I think the guys behind Darwin Awards would have a very different opinion from us on this subject...

eekee wrote:But regardless of the danger, thank you for the detail. I've heard of the diet before, but had no calorie figure to associate with it. There is a danger even for the right type of diabetes: 800 calories is below the minimum 1000 recommended for adults, so you have to be careful. When I last heard of this diet, it was to be done only under a doctor's supervision.

Having a doctor supervise in one form or another any kind of treatment is always important. In the past I have worked in the development of platforms to aid doctors, patients and caretakers in communicating between them and keeping up with treatment plans. I'm tied to a private think-tank, so yeah, I've been "all over the place" in regard to projects I've worked with. I've worked a lot (and still do) with biomedical engineering.

eekee wrote:Perhaps time and experience has shown it can be implemented by individuals but, having experience with low blood sugar and its effect on the mind, I wouldn't do it unless I lived with someone who has a clear mind and understands the diet. And honestly, I'd take that someone with me when discussing it with a doctor.

That's also so much more important than people think, and with the pandemic, at least in my country, we're now prevented to have someone with us during consults, even the most important ones, because of policies limiting people in certain spaces. In my opinion, in these situations, such limitations should never apply, because a patient alone will always forget things, and will be too distracted with the prospect of a bad prognosis to remember and pay attention to every important detail, let alone the importance of actually having someone there for you when faced with uncomfortable news. Or sometimes someone just needs to not feel alone. Wife went through a rough time in the simple regular consults during pregnancy and I was deprived of sharing those moments (Little Buda came out just perfect, though, despite of all the scares).

I'm kind of thinking maybe the wiki or this forum could have a whole section dedicated to health issues related to coding. Not only those that can be directly or indirectly caused by the habits of coding but also those which might affect your performance, and I'm certain a lot of us have doctor friends (and some of the members in the forum might actually be real life doctors) that could help curate the information available and the way it's exposed to not misguide anyone. More in a raising awareness fashion (most of us will be familiar with eye strain, myopia, ...) and letting people know that not all is an irreversible sentence, not just in the physical field, but in the mental field as well. One thing that I'm particularly passionate about is cognitive overload and cognitive overload induced burnout (I'm actually writing a thesis about it at the moment) and is something I always make sure my students are aware of with every new class of PMSE (Project Management and Software Engineering) and how it affects them as developers and as a team.

Posted: **Sat Sep 18, 2021 5:54 am**

@BigBuda Thank you for adding that warning.
I am very happy that you did post your advice too, I think it's great to let people know that there are options for them to improve their quality of life and totally support you. I also know people (even smart people!) can act rashly sometimes though and many people will read this thread over time. I only wanted to make sure they were given as much info as possible to make the choice that's right for them.

@eekee

I do hope you didn't interpret my post as disrespectful at all either, it was definitely intended as a general caution to everyone reading.

If there is anything I've learned over the last two years it's that, even with the best intentions, people can be a little irrational when they are worried about their health! The internet is a great tool to spread information and hope, but with any powerful tool it needs to be used with the utmost caution.

I'm kind of thinking maybe the wiki or this forum could have a whole section dedicated to health issues related to coding.

I think a pinned/stickied thread about mental and physical health for programmers would be a great idea. It's something that is rarely talked about but our passion can certainly be bad for a person's health, I was actually really happy to see this thread as it raises awareness of a real issue for people like us and I've been following it keenly. I know I could certainly stand to improve my own physical well-being as I'm starting to realize I'm not a young man any more!

I've personally suffered from a mild burnout in the past too which has had consequences both at work and at home, so I'd love to read about strategies to better self-manage.

Posted: **Sat Sep 18, 2021 6:06 am**

Computing with exercise

DavidCooper wrote:
eekee wrote:Display is an issue.
I'm surprised there still isn't something simple that lets you flip down a lens and mirror in front of one or both eyes with the screen(s) kept horizontal - this could then become the screen for all your cameras, phones, computers and TVs, although you'd have to have some alternative way of doing touch. Ideally it would also have a camera on it to show the view ahead so that you can merge the two inputs and see your computer screen semi-transparent with the world ahead of you also visible. The technology needed for this has been around in video camera viewfinders for decades.

Yeah. I'm quite sure semi-transparency would work better than a camera, but otherwise, yes. I'd forgotten about video camera viewfinders. In my steampunk days, I wanted to mix steampunk style with cyberpunk tech, including flip-down screens over my glasses.

But I couldn't get anything done in those days.

Android supports USB pointing devices, but when I last tried it, many apps required pinch for zoom. You'd need a capacitative touchpad of some sort. I don't like them, so I thought about a pair of thumbsticks: you would move either one for normal pointer movement, or both in opposite directions for pinch. But I think it might move the pointer before the pinch. That could be "solved" with heuristics, but I don't like heuristics at all. I'm looking for ways to do without them.

I wonder if command-line zoom commands with an overlayed grid would be good. There's a scene in Blade Runner where a picture is overlaid with a 4x4 grid on a computer screen, and the detective says something like, "Select sector 1 0, and Zoom." The selected square then fills the screen. I'll have to try it.

DavidCooper wrote:
Instead of a screen, audio is an option.
It would be good if we could get together some binary blobs that people can add to their operating systems to provide basic speech synthesis compactly and some form of speech recognition that could at least replicate keyboard input without the keyboard. I've recently had a go at speech synthesis using JavaScript and Web Audio where I built all the vowels needed for English out of ten sine waves on the harmonic sequence, plus sounds like s and sh using modified sine waves with randomly adjusted frequency, as well as click consonants where there's a silence followed by a very short fricative or sibilant. This leads to very compact code, although you obviously need something like HD Audio too (which again could potentially be put together as a binary blob).

Cool!

I was aware you don't need very many sounds. And I recall espeak which, together with portaudio, wasn't very large at all. You really don't need hardware support. I recall a "mod tracker" resampling and mixing 16 channels perfectly under MS-DOS on a 10MHz 286. There wasn't even a Gravis Ultrasound in sight. (The "GUS" was the one sound card capable of doing all that in hardware in that era.) Multitasking makes the job harder by messing with timing, but simple buffering fixes the problems if you don't need instant response. Real-time operating system facilities would also help. But anyway, resampling for different frequencies is the tricky part. Mixing same-frequency samples is just multiplication (scaling) followed by addition of each sample.

Incidentally, espeak is clear but has a little flaw: It makes a quiet, breathy "glurr" under certain words. After many hours of listening with excellent-quality headphones, I found I could no longer ignore the creepiness of it.

I'll never forget the good or the bad of espeak!

DavidCooper wrote:
But having written all that about wearables, I don't understand how they would be more environmentally friendly. Surely, you could generate power with the treadmill of a walking desk.
I assumed they were all powered. If some aren't and it's still practical to type while using them, then that that would solve my immediate problem. I'd like to be able to try one before buying it though as sending things back is really awkward.

Oh of course, I forgot how treadmills work. Looking it up, I see they use rather a lot of power. Hmm... you could move an unpowered treadmill by pushing against a band strung between the side rails, but I guess the force would have to be light or it wouldn't be comfortable. Given the power drawn by normal treadmills, I suppose an unpowered one would be like walking uphill. It could be easier if it didn't have a belt, but that raises a lot of other issues.

You know, rotating mechanisms can be very low-friction... No, I don't think very many people would want to install 4.5m hamster wheels!

Perhaps there's an alternative to treadmills. An electric bicycle is enough to keep my legs in working order, admittedly with the exception of my feet. Environmentally, stationary cycles can and have been used to generate power. For computing, an arrangement like a reclining bike would leave your hands free while you pedal. Alternatively, a conventional cycling exercise machine could be fitted with a chording keyboard and a thumbstick on the handlebars. I've cycled enough to know it's feasible if you don't have to steer and brake.

The touble with cycling is the lack of flexing of the feet. I massage my feet occasionally, but I can feel when they need it. It's my understanding that DVT appears without warning.

DavidCooper wrote:
I'm glad you're getting better. I'm already feeling better from my diabetes with just a little care for my diet.
Thanks, and I wish you the best with your health issue too.

Thanks.

DavidCooper wrote:
Edit: I forgot to note my thoughts on programming with a small screen. I didn't find any really wonderful ideas, only trying to figure out how various languages would work with flowing text because that gets more on the screen. I think Forth could work quite well if the start of each definition is colorized. "Plain English" obviously could, although its authors prefer one sentence per line. Oh huh... now I remember your machine code editor already makes maximal use of the screen, David.
You can manage surprisingly well with very little screen. One of my recent projects is a JavaScript keyboard program and text editor for multilingual input, but I've also built a JavaScript layout for writing code in a similar way to the ZX Spectrum (whole word per key, or entire template programs and functions). I've attached a photo of it. The small part of the screen used to display the program you write with it is big enough to do the job, although it's a lot more comfortable to use the whole screen when trying to find your way around it. (I use the virtual hexagon keyboard in combination with the physical keyboard as a way of reducing repetitive strain injury issues.)

I just feel cramped with a small screen, but it's really due to a variety issues including eyesight. I'm fine when coding Forth in 64x16 character blocks, so long as the text is clear. Perhaps I can reorganize other data to suit small pages too.

But I think I may have made a bit of a mistake in even mentioning small screens. HUD screens must be physically small, but when projected into our vision they become very large. I have some problems with my tolerance for overly sharp pixels and overly blurry antialiasing, but I'd be fine with a moderate resolution screen which isn't magnified too much, or of course a very high-res screen if I can get one.

Changing input devices is a good way to avoid RSI, I think. That hex keyboard is cool. I used one on my tablet for a while. I loved it, but it was unmaintained.

Posted: **Sat Sep 18, 2021 2:56 pm**

eekee wrote:Oh of course, I forgot how treadmills work. Looking it up, I see they use rather a lot of power.

I've been looking at them: judging by the reviews, the cheap ones don't last long, so they'd soon add up to more cost than the expensive ones. They also use so much power that they're completely unethical. Fortunately though, there's a better way. I've been experimenting with a tripod-carrying shoulder strap and a few sticks along with a lightweight ACER One 10, and it really is practical to work on it while walking along: it moves with you in such a way that the keyboard stays still relative to your hands. It also doesn't obstruct too much of your view of the floor/ground ahead. Given the long battery life of this thing and of 4G-wifi devices, it really should be practical to walk miles from home every day while working (although I haven't used it in bright sunlight, but it wouldn't be hard to shade it, and that would also keep light rain off it). The only issue at the moment is that it's a little uncomfortable on the back of my neck, so I want to try having the strap(s) go down to a counterweight behind me. That counterweight could be some kind of battery pack which would let me use the older machines that I do most of my actual programming work on. I have to make this work because both sitting and standing cause serious health problems: you have to walk.

Environmentally, stationary cycles can and have been used to generate power.

The problem is with all those hours spent in the saddle, and it would involve sitting heavily on it too as you can't really work while exercising hard.

Changing input devices is a good way to avoid RSI, I think. That hex keyboard is cool. I used one on my tablet for a while. I loved it, but it was unmaintained.

My keyboard program was originally written to serve as a wysiwyg layout editor for the BEST keyboard Android app which is so hard to set up that it likely has fewer than ten users. http://lattilad.org/vicky/blog/my_andro ... version_72, but it is available for free for anyone to use. It was designed and written by a disabled writer and his doctor (both Hungarian), but the doctor (the actual programmer) never had time to write a layout editor for it, so the layouts have always had to be written manually by users in the "coat" language (called coat because it's for something that's covered in buttons). They set out to replace a discontinued hexagon keyboard which is likely the one that you used to use, but they also wanted to improve on it. I offered to have a go at writing an editor for them, although I haven't yet got it to the point where my program can generate complete coat files to set up the app, but I've ended up writing an entirely independent hexagon keyboard program with the same essential functionality as theirs, plus a lot of extra features to suit my own needs. I now store all my bookmarks in it in hierarchies of layouts on different subjects. It can also store long chunks of text to individual keys to make writing faster where the same chunks of text are needed on different occasions. It's all about improving efficiency and reducing the amount of typing I have to do. When it's finished, it too will be available online for people to use for free.

Posted: **Mon Dec 20, 2021 1:14 am**

I'm sorry for disappearing after stating I have a life-threatening medical condition. (I know I've posted recently, but I figure the gap before that needs an explanation.) I've been feeling exceedingly tired due to a ventilation problem. The problems of cabon dioxide build-up ought to be better-known. It's not typically deadly, but it inhibits oxygen uptake so much that under fairly normal circumstances it can reduce brain function by more than half.

I should never have moved in to my present accomodation. It's been a horrible trap due to ventilation issues, and it's worse than ever since the landlord fitted an unsuitable type of exhaust for the flat downstairs. In my last home, I should have bought a fan to draw air in from the tiny window. I think that would have been enough, and if so, I would have quite a lot to show by now because I moved in to that place in 2011. But in those days I didn't dare do anything sensible because my family and their horrible friends made sure I never dared think for myself in practical or social matters. Anyway, I got away from them a few years ago, and I'm looking for another place to live.

Posted: **Mon Dec 20, 2021 2:35 pm**

I'd better give an update too then. Thanks to Covid jamming up the hospitals, I've never been able to get a scan to see the blood clots that I know are there, and I'm getting practically no help in dealing with them, so it's all down to Aspirin as I try to help them dissolve out. I had another attack of the same kind a week ago, though it eased off after a minute instead of seven, plus a very minor one yesterday where I could feel my heart working a bit harder against increased resistance while a mechanism kicked in to make me breathe a bit deeper and faster. If these aren't showers of small clots (which seems less likely now as those should all be gone by now), they must be bigger ones/fragments that break up easily. I had a series of lesser attacks like this last one earlier in the year (before the big one three months ago) but didn't know what they were at the time.

Dissolving these clots makes them more likely to move, but my health is actually better after each attack and I can feel the clots reducing. I just have to hope there isn't another big one. The two big ones were both preceded by a lot of pain from where the clot broke free, so there's a good chance that any more that severe will have a similar warning in advance, and my response now when I feel something might be heading that way is to avoid putting any pressure on the location of the pain so as not to help the clot shift, and I take extra Aspirin in advance to help it break up more quickly if it does shift.

The physiological response to an attack clearly evolved to handle this kind of attack by cutting circulation to the limbs while prioritising the heart and brain, and the heart pounds away at the clot(s) to try to break it up and push the parts further in past more branches of the pulmonary arteries so as to get some blood flow restored to the lungs. This likely happens to a lot of people without them ever working out what's going on, while doctors are programmed to assume they've had a panic attack if they have a big one. My doctor did everything he could to explore the problem but was ultimately unable to refer me on through to the hospital because the queues for scans are a mile long due to Covid clogging up the system (while people get no treatment for all manner of things that will likely kill them - this is just not a good time to get ill) - I don't meet the criteria as I recovered too well from the attacks: you're supposed to be left close to unconscious by them and then take months to recover.

If extended sitting is generating pains down there for you too, they may well be blood clots causing trouble. Take action to change the way you work straight away instead of risking growing a whole stack of them. I had no idea it was possible to get into this position so easily. On the upside though, Aspirin is clearly working - I can now stand all day without my feet swelling up due to the improved circulation.

I actually did build a proper wearable frame out of plastic coat hangers (technically trouser hangers - not so wide) to enable walking while working on a computer and it works well enough just with walking on the spot without having to go anywhere: much better than a walking desk, and zero cost. Programming is now a healthy activity, and that's a game changer.

Posted: **Sun Jan 16, 2022 3:26 pm**

Another update:-

Thanks to a lead from Gerry Rzeppa (of Plain English Programming), I've been taking Nattokinase for the last three weeks and I now can't feel the presence of any clots in the places they were repeatedly breaking loose from, and there have also been no more of them reaching my lungs. This is an enzyme that breaks down fibrin in clots in a way that Aspirin cannot do, and it's much safer than Aspirin too having been tested for a thousand years by the Japanese in the form of Natto (fermented soy). It looks as if this magic stuff is the reason the Japanese live so long - it guards against a host of health problems. I'll keep going with this for another month at the same dose of 8000 units a day, then I'll cut down to 2000 a day (or every other day) for the long term to make sure the problem never reoccurs.

I also find out about a rare condition called ischiogluteal bursitis which fits the rest of the symptoms I've had. This condition used to be known as "weaver's bottom" and it had been making sitting more and more uncomfortable over the last couple of years, as well as making it impossible to sleep on my back: a month ago it was getting to the point where I couldn't sleep at all as it was spreading round the sides and leaving no comfortable way to lie down. It may also be that the blood clots developed as part of this condition rather than as a separate one, but I can't find any mention of a link between the two things in the literature. Aspirin was making the bursitis worse. Ibuprofen is recommended as a way to tackle this, but it turns out that Nattokinase also has inflammatory properties and has now already done most of the job: everything's returning to normal fast and hopefully I'm out of danger.

So, if anyone else thinks they're developing problems of this kind, I can strongly recommend this Japanese solution.

Posted: **Sun Jan 16, 2022 4:36 pm**

DavidCooper wrote:This is an enzyme that breaks down fibrin in clots in a way that Aspirin cannot do, and it's much safer than Aspirin too having been tested for a thousand years by the Japanese in the form of Natto (fermented soy). It looks as if this magic stuff is the reason the Japanese live so long - it guards against a host of health problems. I'll keep going with this for another month at the same dose of 8000 units a day, then I'll cut down to 2000 a day (or every other day) for the long term to make sure the problem never reoccurs.

Well, I generally cook with soy sauce as a replacement for plain salt, so maybe that helps.

DavidCooper wrote:So, if anyone else thinks they're developing problems of this kind, I can strongly recommend this Japanese solution.

Please remember that your case, for now, is anecdotal at best. The fact that you're feeling better and have no symptoms can just be a coincidence, or a placebo effect. In any case, I hope it's not placebo effect or just coincidence, I hope you're on to something. Many people could be helped if it was actually true. Have you found any papers actually discussing Nattokinase? (I actually found quite a few, but haven't got the time to even read the abstracts at the moment).

Posted: **Mon Jan 17, 2022 11:41 am**

BigBuda wrote:Well, I generally cook with soy sauce as a replacement for plain salt, so maybe that helps.

That won't help - it's only when you add the right bacteria to it to ferment it that nattokinase is generated, leading to a slimy food called natto which they say smells like a dead, rotting rat. I'm quite sure the Japanese wouldn't eat the stuff if it didn't have substantial health benefits.

Please remember that your case, for now, is anecdotal at best.

I gave doctors the opportunity to explore this and they failed to (primarily because of Covid limiting their options). I'm also not going to repeat the experiment for them later, but there must be a lot of people out there being killed by attacks of this kind, and anyone who's at risk of one needs to be warned about it and told how to avoid it.

The fact that you're feeling better and have no symptoms can just be a coincidence, or a placebo effect.

This has been shooting multiple clots at my lungs, and on three occasions I've been able to feel where the clot came from and that it was no longer causing trouble where it had been very evident before the attack. The second biggest attack came from a point which had been so painful that I couldn't even sit on the loo because of it that night, and then when I went to bed, the pressure on it caused it to move, then wham: straight into another attack with the blood supply to my lungs cut off again almost completely, though this time only for a minute before it began to ease off. These couldn't be easier to diagnose. Again, total recovery within minutes. No one makes up stories like this. There must be other people out there having the same kind of attacks and recovering just as completely (if they survive them). The last attack was a small one, but I could feel where it had come from and that there was another clot there in danger of breaking free and following it, if not a whole flock of them. That was when I realised that Aspirin wasn't good enough to handle this and I remembered Gerry's mention of nattokinase months ago which I hadn't paid enough attention to before as it sounded like quackery. So I researched it properly to see if it was backed by any serious science.

Have you found any papers actually discussing Nattokinase? (I actually found quite a few, but haven't got the time to even read the abstracts at the moment).

Start here: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6043915/

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