By Rauf Fadzilla
Pix Credit: qwerty-definition.seebyseeing.net The QWERTY keyboard. |
Ever wondered why the keyboard
keys are arranged this way?
The QWERTY keyboard, named for
the arrangement of letters on the top left row of the alphanumeric keyboard is
the most common arrangement for keys on a keyboard or typewriter.
The QWERTY keyboard, designed
by Christopher Sholes, was manufactured in 1874 by Remington & Sons and was
called the Remington Number 1.
Interestingly enough, it may
have been designed this way because of the limitations of early typewriter
technology.
When you press a key, J for
example, on an early typewriter, the character J would swing from a bar and hit
a tape coated with ink which would then transfer the letter J onto the paper
behind the tape.
The problem was that on this early
typewriter, the bars would collide with each other and jam the device if the
keys were typed too fast.
So the story is that Sholes
arranged the keys with the most common letters in hard to reach parts of the
keyboard, to slow down the typist's speed.
The Dvorak keyboard is an
alternative to the QWERTY keyboard and arranges characters with vowels on one
side and consonants on the other. Apparently it's easier to use because your
fingers do less travelling between letters.
Pix Credit: workawesome.com The Dvorak keyboard |
I don't know about you but
I've gotten so used to the QWERTY keyboard that I couldn't possibly use any
other keyboard.
I can type quite fast on it
too and I couldn't imagine using a keyboard with say, all the letters arranged
in alphabetical order.
Pix Credit: badhaven.com His writings are indecipherable but he can type pretty fast. |
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