Photo by Digger/ATL on Flickr from the Pixel Rigs group

Michael Lopp has a, so far, two piece series on screen arrangements and productivity with Mac OS X Lion. One of the links back in the second piece talks about the Flickr group Pixel Rigs, which Lopp established back in Jan. 2008.

While the series itself is interesting, and I find myself nodding along, what is more interesting to me is how diverse pixel workers set-up their physical environments. Everything from very small, sparse layouts to, “Holy heck, he has how many screens?.” There are few observations I have about what I’m seeing:

• Some folks like lots of screen real estate. A lot of it is cobbled out of various monitors (as above). Others get things as homogenous as possible.
• There’s some variance in number of monitors, but what interests me is where people focus attention. Is the biggest monitor front and center? Do people split their screen arrangement right down the middle?
• There’s a definite DIY feel to a lot of set-ups. Particularly for the vertically oriented monitors for folks who like to see lots of lines of code or CLI scrollback all at once.
• I’m surprised at the ergonomics of a lot of set-ups. A lot of times chairs, mouse and keyboards, internal light and external light all seem off. Clearly, someone’s desk set-up is very personal, but I’m somewhat surprised someone else would find some of these arrangements comfortable.
• The other surprise is the amount of cable clutter and other visual noise people are OK with

By looking at these and critiquing, what I’m really doing is exposing my own pickiness. For instance, having a keyboard propped up by a mouse pad on one side. Would. Bug. Me. Likewise, I see a lot of desks that don’t leave much, if any room for mousing or have no space for a notebook or book stand. I don’t know what people’s circumstances are, or what compromises they’re making for a given set-up. But there are a few that are set-ups I’d value myself. That’s what I’m looking for. An idea.