Which keyboard is used now a days?

QWERTY keyboard layout Modern-day keyboards exhibit the QWERTY keyboard layout instead of having letters in alphabetical order because the original alphabetical layout caused mechanical arms in typewriters to jam when typing quickly.

study.com - QWERTY Keyboard Layout - Video & Lesson Transcript - Study.com

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QWERTY keyboard layout. Notice what the first six letters are in the top left.

The History of the QWERTY Keyboard

The English QWERTY keyboard layout was not the first layout and might not be the most efficient. However, the QWERTY keyboard layout was developed to solve a problem exhibited by some of the first typewriters, which instead had the letter keys in alphabetical order. Unlike modern-day keyboards, typewriters are entirely mechanical devices. When a key is pressed on a typewriter, a mechanical arm with an inked and raised letter is physically moved and pressed onto the typewriter paper. Employees hired as typewriters were hired for their efficiency, skill, and speed at typing on a typewriter. However, the mechanical arms of the typewriter would often jam when too many arms in proximity were in rapid motion. The solution to this problem was to rearrange the letter layout so that the motions of the arms were more spread out while typing in the English language.

The QWERTY layout reduced jamming in typewriter mechanical arms.

The First QWERTY Keyboard Layout

Much of the modern English language keyboard layout exists today due to the development and design of efficient typewriters. Looking at a modern-day keyboard, even the diagonal orientation of the keys reduces the mechanical issues experienced by typewriters. Offsetting the keys on the typewriter helped avoid the issue of mechanical arms interacting with each other. Additionally, even early models of the QWERTY layout lacked the zero and number 1 keys. Typists instead used the letters O and I. The QWERTY layout was designed by the American editor and printer Christopher Latham Sholes who helped develop the first commercially successful typewriter, the Sholes-Glidden typewriter, with the assistance of Carlos S. Glidden and Samuel W. Soule. Sholes examined the English language, looking for the most frequent combinations of letters. Through trial and error, Sholes and his friends reorganized the letters on the typewriter so that the more frequently used letters and keys were farther apart. This adjustment made it so that mechanical arms in proximity were less often in motion at the same time, which limited jamming. Placing these keys farther apart also forced the operator to alternate key-pressing between hands, allowing both hands to work simultaneously, which increased typing speed. The patented Sholes-Glidden typewriter was sold to E. Remington & Sons in 1873. The Remington manufacturing of this keyboard popularized the QWERTY keyboard layout for English language typing.

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Antique Remington No. 1 typewriter with the QWERTY keyboard layout

Telegraph Operators

An alternative theory exists for the development of the QWERTY layout. A story in the Smithsonian and Wisconsin's History of Objects claims that the layout was developed by Sholes with the feedback of telegraph operators. It's possible that the letter arrangement is more efficient when using Morse code. For example, common Morse code lines like "e z" and "s e" are near each other on the QWERTY keyboard layout. In 1868 Sholes even sold early designs of the Sholes-Glidden typewriter to Porter's Telegraph College.

An old telegraph terminal. Notice the letter layout used by the operator.

QWERTY as Industry Standard

The main reason the QWERTY layout is still used today has to do with how it was first popularized. After Sholes sold his patented typewriter to Remington & Sons, they manufactured the typewriter and even trained typists to use them. This forced companies that wanted to hire efficient typists to purchase typewriters from Remington & Sons as all the typists were trained to their QWERTY layout. Eventually, a union developed between Remington, the Smith-Premier Typewriter Company, Caligraph, Densmore and Yost, called the Union Typewriter Company. This conglomerate of typewriter manufacturers agreed to standardize the QWERTY keyboard layout so that all their machines maintained the same layout with very little changes.

Different Types of Keyboard Layout

The QWERTY keyboard layout isn't the only keyboard layout, nor is it the most efficient, depending on the device that is being used to type. Other keyboard layouts were invented, some of which caught on for their specific devices or languages.

study.com - QWERTY Keyboard Layout - Video & Lesson Transcript - Study.com

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