“My fingers run on the key!
You would think it will make music for me!
But the click clack sound was not the quest!
The qwerty keyboard types da best!”
Man (or for that matter woman!), have always tried to make simple things difficult! The forever quest of everyone is that he or she is in a journey which is different or special or more difficult that the other! Even in a team, on person would always feel that he or she is more valuable or doing more work or sometimes both!
This is reflected in one of the most commonest things to have graced our fingers! The keyboard! My mother was great at short hand but she always would have trouble in the keyboard! She would tell why those i@@## could not simply write the alphabets in a straight line! In fact she was correct! The QWERTY keyboard may not be the fastest!
read on why!
So we all know the famous story of how the keyboard was introduced by American inventor and newspaper publisher, Christopher Latham Sholes!
His first keyboard was actually pretty straight forward!
This early typewriter used a keyboard that resembled a piano and had 28 keys arranged alphabetically. The idea was that this was the most efficient arrangement because users would know immediately where to find each letter.
– 3 5 7 9 N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
2 4 6 8 . A B C D E F G H I J K L M
In 1873, Sholes and his investors agrees to sell the production rights to the prototype to gun-maker Remington, which, following the Civil War, had branched out into appliance manufacturing. The Remington company made several modifications in the original design, including rearranging the keyboard to a somewhat familiar layout as we know today!
Why this was done has one theory which is well known! According to this theory, the alphabetically-arranged keyboards allowed users to type at great speed, but when they pressed two closely located keys too quickly, the levers associated with the respective keys would become jammed!
Therefore, a new layout was required that would reduce the key jamming. According to this theory, the QWERTY keyboard was designed to solve this problem with its planned arrangement of letters in different rows.
But big surprise now is that this theory, however, has been largely debunked.
The QWERTY keyboard places keys that are commonly used in pairs close together, such as T and H or E and R, etc. Thus, the QWERTY style turned out to be a more convenient typing model for users and they more easily became accustomed to it due to its user-friendly design!
Another more sound theory is that the the QWERTY typewriter keyboard layout was actually developed from inputs provided by telegraph operators, who would have been the largest users of keyboards at the time!
It was concluded that the operators found the earlier alphabetical arrangement of the keyboard confusing and inefficient for translating morse code.
For example, Morse code represents Z as ‘· · · ·’ which is often confused with ‘SE’. The Morse receivers often could not determine whether to use Z or SE until they received the following letters. Thus, to make it easier for the operators, S ought to be placed close to both Z and E on the keyboard for Morse receivers to type them quickly!
But according to some serious typing enthusiasts, there is another version of keyboard which is faster that the QWERTY!
Also known as the American simplified keyboard, the Dvorak keyboard was designed by Dr. August Dvorak and Dr. William Dealey in 1936. The purpose behind this invention was to develop a more efficient system and faster typing speeds!
Dvorak and his supporters have argued that this non-qwerty keyboard layout is able to increase typing speed and accuracy by 74% and 68% respectively. Dvorak stated that the paired letters in his keyboard were placed in such a manner that typists could locate them faster. Dvorak also claimed that the unusual letter combinations in QWERTY layout were responsible for the frequently occurring typing errors!
However, despite the arguments made by Dr. Dvorak, his keyboard invention failed to replace the QWERTY keyboard pattern. In fact, his claims that the Dvorak layout is faster have also received a lot of criticism. Also, by the time Dvorak came into existence people had already become familiar with QWERTY and regular users were unwilling to learn a new typing system.
Now since the familiarity is so much so that people can type in record breaking speeds! With the invention of the predictive keyboard and the latest SWIPE keyboard, typing is even more easier!
So we may not get to know which keyboard is better since even otherwise very soo, voice typing will surely replace the actual typing soon! Or maybe even thought typing!
All said and done it is a real thrill to see people typing at record breaking speeds!
Of course when you talk about speed then the no one can come close to birthday celebrity Pilavullakandi Thekkeparambil Usha!
Now type GN in you keyboard and sleep!
Shubh Ratri!
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