Facts 27/03/2025 08:54

Why aren't computer keyboards arranged in alphabetical order?

In the era of rapidly developing information technology, computers have become an indispensable means for people. Using computers every day, for hours continuously, 10 fingers clacking on the keyboard but there is a rather interesting feature, do you realize it?

That is, the letters on the computer keyboard are not arranged in alphabetical order. It seems quite messy. Some people think they are completely random, but in fact, there is a purpose.

If you pay attention, you will see that the 6 letter keys in the upper left corner are QWERTY. This is the most popular keyboard standard in the world today. There are also some other types of keyboards such as DVORAK, MALTRON or QWERTZ but QWERTY is still the most popular.

So where does the origin of the keyboard letter order come from?

Back in the 1870s, the man who created the first typewriter, Christopher Latham Sholes, invented the QWERTY keyboard.

Initially, the characters on the typewriter invented by Sholes were arranged in alphabetical order, placed on the end of a metal bar that pressed against the paper when the key was pressed, looking like piano keys.

However, the letters that were used frequently were placed next to each other, when the typewriter typed quickly, the characters that were close together on the keyboard got stuck, tangled together, the typist had to use his hands to remove the typebars and often left marks on the text.

Most computers today use this type of keyboard.

That's why Sholes came up with another keyboard order to overcome this weakness, his invention was patented. Sholes and his associates then sold their design to the first typewriter manufacturer, Remington & Sons. By 1893, Remington and four other major typewriter manufacturers, Caligraph, Yost, Densmore, and Smith-Premier, had agreed to adopt QWERTY as the keyboard standard.

However, there are still some other hypotheses about the birth of today's keyboard.

Accordingly, in 2011, researchers named Koichi Yasuoka and Motoko Yasuoka argued that the origin of the keyboard is related to the Morse code table, which is used to transmit messages in radio telegraphy.

They argued that telegraphers who regularly used typewriters found that the alphabetically arranged keyboard was very confusing in decoding and transcribing messages, so people came up with another type of keyboard.

Although up to now there has been no research that clearly and convincingly confirms the origin of the QWERTY keyboard, people still cannot deny its effectiveness.

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