Typewriter Keyboard: There are several stories floating around explaining why the keys on a keyboard are in the order they are. This is a different topic. Why are the keys offset from...

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

There are several stories floating around explaining why the keys on a keyboard are in the order they are. This is a different topic. Why are the keys offset from the row above and below? They are arranged like the seats in an auditorium.

When you hit a key on a typewriter, a metal arm swings up and hits the platen. If the keyboard wasn't arranged with offset letters, every one of those metal arms would have to have a specific bend to avoid hitting the others. Shifting the keys to one side lets the typewriter use the same shape for each arm - much simpler for the manufacturer. With the move to computers, the manufacturers weren't about to make typists relearn typing.

Speaking of typing, there's a nice French movie - "Populaire" - about typing. It's a very pleasant movie set in the days of typing competitions.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2070776/

gmontjr2350 Loc: Southern NJ

jerryc41 wrote:

There are several stories floating around explaini... (show quote)

There are some recent movies where one of the characters insists upon using an ancient manual because 'reasons'.
And of course, they are badgered about catching up with the times, mistakes don't mean retyping the whole page, etc...
I am of the age where typing was a job for women and so never learned to type. Hunt and peck.

George

bobbyjohn Loc: Dallas, TX

Jerry, as I recall from many decades ago, when we only had typewriters and no computers, even with a QWERTY keyboard, there was still the (slight) possibility of the arms hitting each other, depending on which keys were hit quickly. The QWERTY was designed to have common keys separated to minimize the arms hitting. There have been several attempts over the years to create a keyboard different from QWERTY but for some reason QWERTY has survived. See: https://kinesis-ergo.com/switching-from-qwerty/

The arms hitting problem was fixed by the second generation typewriters, with the IBM Selectric having a ball instead of arms.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

bobbyjohn wrote:

Jerry, as I recall from many decades ago, when we ... (show quote)

We get used to QWERTY, and then some devices have the keys alphabetically.....

ncribble Loc: Albuquerque, NM

Typing was one course in High School that my Mother insisted that I take. I remember being embarrassed that the 'Girls' won every competition. Being a Clarinet player I thought my finger coordination would excel at the keyboard, it didn't.

Regardless, thank you Mother.

bobbyjohn Loc: Dallas, TX

ncribble wrote:

Typing was one course in High School that my Mother insisted that I take.

Me too ... I took typing in high school, and IMO it IS the most beneficial course I've ever taken...beats any academic course in HS or college. The QWERTY typing skills learned in that one class have lasted a lifetime!

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

ncribble wrote:

Typing was one course in High School that my Mother insisted that I take. I remember being embarrassed that the 'Girls' won every competition. Being a Clarinet player I thought my finger coordination would excel at the keyboard, it didn't.

Regardless, thank you Mother.

I never learned to type correctly....
I've gotten pretty quick an the "hunt-n-peck" method after 50 years.
But still not as fast as my wife!!

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

bobbyjohn wrote:

Jerry, as I recall from many decades ago, when we ... (show quote)

Right. If I hit two keys at almost the same time, both arms would shoot up and stick to each other.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Longshadow wrote:

I never learned to type correctly....
I've gotten pretty quick an the "hunt-n-peck" method after 50 years.
But still not as fast as my wife!!

I wish I had learned to type without looking at the keyboard, but I can type very fast. Of course, if I accidentally hit the Caps Lock key, I'll type a whole line before I see my mistake. : )

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

jerryc41 wrote:

I wish I had learned to type without looking at the keyboard, but I can type very fast. Of course, if I accidentally hit the Caps Lock key, I'll type a whole line before I see my mistake. : )

Been there, done that!

kpmac Loc: Ragley, La

I took typing in high school because I wanted an easy credit. That was a mistake. It was not easy but it served me well in the US Army as there was a shortage of clerk typists at the time. It kept me out of the infantry and also the signal corp—much easier duty.

Beowulf Loc: Aquidneck Island, RI

bobbyjohn wrote:

Me too ... I took typing in high school, and IMO it IS the most beneficial course I've ever taken...beats any academic course in HS or college. The QWERTY typing skills learned in that one class have lasted a lifetime!

Me three. I took a year long Typing 1 class in my junior year of high school. I was the only male among 26 aspiring secretary/typists. While I could not quite do as well as they did, I never regretted learning to type without looking at the keyboard. In college, as an English major and Economics minor, I would have to produce 10-15 typed thesis papers per semester, so the typing facility came in handy. At soon-to-be 80 years of age, I can still type 55 wpm.

Najataagihe

ncribble wrote:

Typing was one course in High School that my Mother insisted that I take. I remember being embarrassed that the 'Girls' won every competition. Being a Clarinet player I thought my finger coordination would excel at the keyboard, it didn't.

You missed a trick.

Our band folks were always the fastest, because we would type in tempo.

When we started typing drum cadences, our teacher went nuts!

Thanks for the memory!

JohnSwanda Loc: San Francisco

gmontjr2350 wrote:

There are some recent movies where one of the characters insists upon using an ancient manual because 'reasons'.
And of course, they are badgered about catching up with the times, mistakes don't mean retyping the whole page, etc...
I am of the age where typing was a job for women and so never learned to type. Hunt and peck.

George

I was in high school in the mid '60s, and almost everyone took typing classes, male and female. It was not a matter of doing it as a job, but since it was mostly a college prep high school, and papers in college were going to be required to be typed. The high school actually required all papers to be typed, and correction fluid was not allowed, so I often did have to retype many pages when I made a mistake.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Najataagihe wrote:

You missed a trick.

Our band folks were always the fastest, because we would type in tempo.

When we started typing drum cadences, our teacher went nuts!

Thanks for the memory!

Cadences, excellent!
Wish I could have heard that.