benw (10/09/82)
One time I was stress testing a Fortran 77 program and ended up in a truss for months (and you thought you hardware types were the only ones to get disability!) Not afraid to name my sign, Taurus
bcw (10/10/82)
From: Bruce C. Wright @ Duke University Re: Computer injuries About 5 or 6 years ago, I got cut fairly deeply from a terminal I was carrying - the terminal casing was a heavy wire mesh without protecting the cut edges and it slipped in my hands. It wasn't too serious but it could certainly have been prevented by a better-designed terminal. Our Field Service engineer for some of the PDP-11's around here got cut deeply enough to require stitches while working on the equipment - I think the scenario was not unlike the one described by Herb Jellinek. I'm sure that there are quite a few injuries on computer equipment, but the worst injury in the lab I work in was caused by a common, ordinary desk. Some people were trying to move the desk and the top came unstuck from the rest of the desk, and in the ensuing melee one person nearly had a finger cut off. Probably our experience is not unusual - computers may have hazardous areas but they are probably not exceptionally dangerous compared to any of a number of other common objects. Bruce C. Wright @ Duke University
mike (10/13/82)
#R:burdvax:-21800:brl-bmd:2800001:000:700 brl-bmd!mike Oct 11 12:09:00 1982 Hardware people seem to get chewed up quite a bit. Some of the culprits are: *) Cards with inadequate extractors. The back of the cards frequently eat not only hands, but cables too! *) Inadequate provisions for cable routing. And always near sharp metal edges. *) Inconvienient cabinet design, requiring you to "climb in" to access adjustments. (Ex: PDP-11 power supply, voltage adjustment). Maybe some day hardware manufacturers will be more aware of the issues involved with making equipment easy to service.... (Raised floors are good sources of injury, too! Plenty of sharp edges just waiting to chomp on man or cable) -Mike Muuss Ballistic Research Laboratory