Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!genrad!mit-eddi!mit-vax!eagle!harpo!seismo!hao!hplabs!sri-unix!REM@MIT-MC From: REM%MIT-MC@sri-unix.UUCP Newsgroups: net.works Subject: Keyboards Message-ID: <1793@sri-arpa.UUCP> Date: Sun, 12-Jun-83 00:39:00 EDT Article-I.D.: sri-arpa.1793 Posted: Sun Jun 12 00:39:00 1983 Date-Received: Wed, 8-Jun-83 15:06:07 EDT Lines: 32 From: Robert Elton MaasHow about flushing some of the lesser-used letters (ZXQ) and special characters (@%`_) from their normal places, letting [control] [meta] [shift] [shiftlock] [top] [untop] and ESC take their places, requiring extra keystrokes for those rare characters but in exchange you can type 20% faster because you never have to reach waaaaaay over there for CTRL or META or anything else? Shift: Gives upper case of letters, second character for numbers Top: Gives second character above letters, third character above numbers Untop:Gives third character below letters, fourth character below numbers Control:gives ASCII control meaning, or 8th bit, depending on mode Meta:gives 8th bit, or 9th bit, depending on mode Keys whose direct representation isn't used by you personally could be reprogrammed to be others you do need directly, like when typing stuff with lots of leftarrows, the ! key (shift-1) could be made into a leftarrow. It seems a more compact keyboard, programmable so that the thirty most often needed keys (including shift-like ones) would always be in easy reach where qwertyuiop asdfghjkl; zxcvbnm,./ are normally, and the next ten where 0123456789 are normally, and all the rest via combinations instead of frantic reaching, would yield easier typing once you get used to it. I suggest *nothing* outside that basic 40-key (4 rows of 10 keys each) at all, thus if your hand is out of position your little fingers fall off the edge or your thumbs bump, you don't accidently rest on alpha-lock or del or whatever is to the left or right of the basic-40 keys, thus it's virtually impossible to accidently type out of reegistry, and it's unnecessary to look at the keyboard to put hands back into registry. Comments?