3 Tools To Remind Yourself To Take A Break & Relax While Working At The Computer

Working on the computer may not be very physical, nevertheless it’s tough on your body. Sitting all day can hurt your lower back and has a negative impact on your circulation. Extensive typing can stiffen the muscles in your upper back and neck, and finally staring at the screen for hours on end is very tiring and can cause serious problems, such as dry eyes. Moreover, office work has been associated with insomnia and anxiety. If you are damned to spend your working hours behind a desk, you had better find ways to do something good for your body.

The good news is that short breaks of relaxing and stretching can do wonders for your health and well being. And who doesn’t like to take breaks during work? In this article I will show you tools you can integrate into your workday to remind you that you need to take a break.

EVO

EVO is a website helper which runs your selection of a default or custom timer that will remind you of a 5 or 10 minute break. The setup is simplistic and not intrusive. During the screen, EVO can black out your screen and count down the time of your break.

EVO also provides instructions for eye gymnastics that you can go through during your break.

The creators of EVO have also launched a website that has information about theComputer Vision Syndrome.

Big Stretch Reminder (Windows)

Big Stretch Reminder is a reminder app designed to remind you to do regular stretches during your work day. It comes with a variety of options, including custom settings. You can select the time between breaks from a list of predefined options or create a custom setting.

For the reminder mode you can choose between a non-intrusive balloon mode or an intrusive popup mode. The third option, the micro-break mode, is of the intrusive popup type. The message that is shown along with your break reminder can be a random tip or customized.

Breaker (Windows)

If you’re a workaholic who has no trouble getting lost in work and forgetting the time, then you should try Breaker. It’s a simple software that lets you set up breaks individually in a loop or pattern.

The app runs in the system tray and when you hover over it you can see the countdown to your next break. Once the time has run out, a quiet alarm and a little window in the bottom right of the screen reminds you that it’s time for a break or to get back to work.

Since Breaker allows the creation of custom patterns, it is also a great tool to easily remind yourself of meetings or appointments scattered throughout the day.

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Top-five Cancer-causing foods

1. Hot Dogs


Because they are high in nitrates, the Cancer Prevention Coalition advises that children eat no more than 12 hot dogs a month. If you can't live without hot dogs, buy those made without sodium nitrate.




2. Processed meats and Bacon



Also high in the same sodium nitrates found in hot dogs, bacon, and other processed meats raise the risk of heart disease. The saturated fat in bacon also contributes to cancer.




3. Doughnuts


Doughnuts are cancer-causing double trouble. First, they are made with white flour, sugar, and hydrogenated oils, then fried at high temperatures. Doughnuts, says Adams , may be the worst food you can possibly eat to raise your risk of cancer.




4. French fries


Like doughnuts, French fries are made with hydrogenated oils and then fried at high temperatures. They also contain cancer- causing acryl amides which occur during the frying process. They should be called cancer fries, not French fries, said Adams .




5. Chips, crackers, and cookies



All are usually made with white flour and sugar. Even the ones whose labels claim to be free of trans-fats generally contain small amounts of trans-fats.

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6 Cool VLC Tips & Tricks You Might Not Know About

VLC media player is a real box of tricks. We’ve already established that it pretty much plays everything, requires little in the way of system resources and is just as effective on a Windows operating system as it is on Mac or Linux.
If you’ve not used VLC in the past (and are desperate for a decent media solution) then I’d urge you to download it and give it a go. Those of you who are already using VLC might be surprised to know there’s a few features that don’t really get the recognition they deserve.
Here are a few VLC tips and tricks that will hopefully help you get more use and enjoyment from VLC.

Streaming Capabilities

One use for VLC that not many users are too familiar with is its capacity as a network streaming workhorse. As you can see from the diagram below, using VLC as a streaming solution for your media gives you one of the best cross-compatible media sharing setups around, especially useful if you have a variety of PCs and operating systems in your household.

If you’re looking to stream video from your home PC whilst you’re away then you can also set VLC to stream to the Internet. Dont forget to sort out your DNS settings beforehand for a pain-free connection!
If you’re wondering how to get the most out of VLC’s streaming abilities, check out Angela’s detailed article.

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Rip & Transcode Videos

Whilst there are a number of good, free video converters, why download even more software when you can already do it with VLC? Not only can VLC be used to convert video from one format to another, but it can also be used to rip disc-based media (video or music), live streams (television, cable, satellite) or network streams to file.

To get started open VLC and click Media then Convert/Save. You’ll be presented with a dialogue which allows you to choose between converting, ripping and saving to file. Once you’ve added source media (to record from) click Convert/Save.

The next window allows you to choose encoding settings such as codecs and output location. Don’t forget to have patience, transcoding video is resource-intensive and can take a while (regardless of how much the software costs).

Internet Radio & Podcast Management

Reaffirming its role as a multi-use media player, VLC also contains in-built Internet radio listings and a podcast aid to boot. Simply open your Playlist and select Internet on the left. You should then see a number of services pop up including Icecast Radio and Jamendo Selections. It’s all free, and there’s full albums available if that’s your thing.

If you’d like VLC to keep a track of podcasts then hover Podcasts in the Playlist and click on the plus symbol “+” that appears. Enter the podcast’s URL to add it to your database.

Video Effects

Partly useful, partly there for fun; there’s plenty you can do to your video files with VLC to spice things up a bit. Whilst playing a video (this works in real time) click Tools and then Effects and Filters to open the adjustments window.

Choose Video Effects from the first tab, and have a play around. You can adjust useful settings like gamma, brightness and hue should you have a poor-quality (too dark, bad white balance) video file. The other tabs are mostly reserved for fun, with crazy psychedelic and water effects to choose from as well as video rotation, text and logo overlay options.

Snapshots

If you’ve ever wanted, needed or tried to take a still image of a video then you may have had issues using the usual “print screen” methods. Luckily VLC features the ability to take a snapshot and save to .PNG format in a location of your choice.

You can either pause, jog and find the exact scene you want or take your shot during playback. With a video open in VLC, choose Video then Snapshot (or right click on the video and use the context menu). VLC will then show a brief overlay of the snapshot in the top left, and the snapshot will be saved to the location defined in Preferences then Video under Snapshot.

Play Video as ASCII Output

Last on the list as it has absolutely no real use, but will probably bring a grin to your face nonetheless. In VLC choose Tools then Preferences and click on Video. Under Output choose ASCII -art video output and click Save.

Now play a video and enjoy the amazing spectacle that is moving ASCII art. Useless, but fun!