I guess I’m not nerd enough, I just clean my keyboard when they stop working, which is every 3 or 4 months.
I am with the majority of posters here. I cannot stand anyone touching my screen. I had once worked with a guy that used dry erase markers on his screen (CRT) to mark out line grids. After a while the grease in the pen left permanent marks on the monitor (they are glass, but still coated). I hated having to work with him at his desk because letters would be blurry and make the process difficult. It would not clean off no matter what he used.
I will usually use Lysol on my keyboard and phone (spray into the rag and wipe them with the rag) before leaving for home (every other month or so).
M Kenyon
My boss at the time was a hardware engineer that was promoted to look after the software development team, so EVERYTHING to the man was just a tool. He would get mad if we couldn’t give him a good estimate of how long it would take to write something… his reason… “If I was building a splice enclosure and told my boss I didn’t know how long it would take, I’d get fired.” He had no real concept of software or what it involved. We weren’t building a box to hold cables… we were writing software to detect faults in the fiber…
And like I said, this was during the big money times for the Fiber Optic Cable industry… we were blowing money like no one’s business. The software I worked on was a loss leader for the company… something we had to offer, but they didn’t really care if we made money or not. Probably one reason the software group was laid off after the bust!
WA
Doesn’t anyone else think that it’s the office cleaner’s job to wipe down keyboards/mice/screens/telephones?
Having said that I regularly bring in some Mr. Muscle and give the place a wipe down, but I always feel like I shouldn’t have to!
When I used to work at Future Shop (a Canadian electronics retailer owned by Best Buy) we used to push Monster screen clean all the time for monitors and TVs. I know the sales guys pushed it because the markup was high, but we techs recommended it because it was just that much better than any alternative. I still recommend it to my friends to this day.
I think there is some magic in that bottle, because I swear my TV gets less dusty after using Monster on it.
At the last job I had people used to CONSTANTLY touch other folks monitors.
I had gotten two new flatscreens and it wasn’t a day later that someone ‘poked’ it leaving a nice fingerprint right in the center.
So I put a post it note next to them that said, “Touch the screen, lose a finger”.
I really hate it when people try to touch my LCD monitors. When I say touch, I mean, they stab it with their fingers. LCDs break that way, stupid!
You all sound so childish about your monitors being touched. Its Just A Piece of Plastic! Pair programming with two 22" LCDs, the other coder is driving (controlling keyboard and mouse) and something needs to be pointed out, I’m going to point at it with my finger. OMG !! END OF THE WORLD !! FIRE!FIRE!FIRE!FIRE!!!
Most of the time my finger wont touch the monitor. Sometimes that perfect storm of circumstances do align against me. I’ll be eating a Bagel, and some of the cream cheese gets on my finger, and so I lick my finger clean, and before finishing the bagel I point at something on the screen, and accidentally touch the screen. On those very seldom occasions it leaves a small smudge. woop-dee-doo… i’ve got those lint-less cloths at my desk, and i just wipe the smudge off.
Sounds like the problem most of you have is with people who have Dirty Hands. Well if someones got dirty hands, then they should just be told to go wash their hands, it may seem rude the first couple times, but quickly people start remembering to wash their hands.
My monitor is spotlessly clean, and my hands are clean, doing a touch test, touching the monitor with my finger doesn’t even leave a smudge.
The Keyboard-Mouse interface is horrible, and Touch screen displays are coming. What are you going to do then? crawl under your desks and hide? No of course not, dirty fingers are just going to become more taboo.
So get everyone headed in the right direction now. When someone touches your monitor and leaves a smudge don’t get mad at a user using a computer in a completely natural way, get mad at them for having disgustingly dirty hands.
I hear that Prozac and Lexapro are good for those who are germa-phobic.
So, anybody got some tips on a keyboard that’s easy to clean? The standard designs seem intended to suck down dirt and trap it where you can’t get to it. Without removing every single key top, anyway. Maybe they want you to buy a new one every 3 months.
At my college, we had these Solaris computers with 19" screens… and every one of them was covered in smudges everywhere, it was aweful. Cleaning them didn’t seem to work very well either.
I gotta try the keyboard/dishwasher thing, I just don’t want to have to wait a week to use it again.
Fry’s has keyboards for $5. I just consider them disposable and buy in bulk.
Oh. My. God.
I bet you’re sick all the time. People with germophobic cleaning fetishes are the most often ill people I know.
Also, freaking out about things like people touching your screen is the reason all the normal people are afraid of the IT department. A little tolerance goes a long way. I find that my projects become a lot easier when I can relate to the business folks as if we are both human beings.
@AC: It’s called multitasking ho. Something you won’t be able to do on your computer if you don’t have a keyboard because it is in the dish washer.
The Keyboard-Mouse interface is horrible, and Touch screen displays
are coming. What are you going to do then? crawl under your desks and
hide? No of course not, dirty fingers are just going to become more
taboo.
Most of the systems I’ve written software for have had touch displays because someone thought they would be a huge seller for the system. I’ve only seen one of those systems in which users continued using the touch screen after a week or so of use, and in that case there was no way to plug in a keyboard and mouse without opening the case.
There are things that make sense with a touch display, and software can be designed to make the most of it (with REALLY BIG BUTTONS). On the other hand, there are things that programmers do with computers, and for the most part they don’t work well with touch displays. I don’t even use the touch screen on my phone any more than I absolutely have to, though I do like the clock interface for setting the time on alarms in Windows Mobile (otherwise the interface is notoriously bad for a touch interface unless you use the stylus all the time).
This is why I bought the iSkin when I first got my Mac. It’s nice to the touch and easy to clean–just rinse in water and soap. Of course the sound of tapping keys may be music to the ears of some people, but I’ve gotten used to the soft touch.
However, I would say the best practice would be to have a hand sanitizer (anti-bacterial) sitting next on your workarea, next to your monitor or something.
Don’t forget about your cruddy mouse, too.
I teach IT in a school. It’s best not to look between the keys.
Why do people constantly compare dirty things to toilet seats? I clean my toilet more frequently than I clean some parts of my kitchen - and I bet you’re all the same.
If the gunge and dirt in our keyboards is so hazardous, how come we’re not ill? Could it be we have immunities to the things living on surfaces we come into contact with daily?
How about we do what our parents kept telling us - wash your hands before eating, and don’t stick them in your mouth.
Touching monitors is a crime that should be punished with amputation or something else appropriate. Cleaning shiny screens is impossible!
Keyboards are disgusting: http://www.xckd.com/237/
I am solidly the type who never touches their display and hate it when someone else touches mine. What I did realize at one point, though, was that I’d live longer if I accepted the other type of programmer, and, without getting bent, simply cleaned my screen after “he” left. No rise in blood pressure, no resentment, no losing the point discussed.
You know what? If no one touched my screen, I would clean it way less often, and it would actually be dirtier!!
Jeff,
how about hosing down the keyboard? You know, with a hose 
I tried that couple of times and it was awesome. Fun for the whole family. Not so much fun looking for blown off keys in the grass but that can be sorted out by settling on moderate water pressure. Just soap up the darn thing and then hose it off.
For cleaning laptop keyboards, I use photo lense brush. It works great. And some travel wet wipes (baby wipes will also work :))
I worked with a dude who would pointtouch so vigorously that the flat screen tilted backward every time he made a point.