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Aucb.516 fa.editor-p utcsrgv!utzoo!decvax!ucbvax!C70:editor-people Tue Feb 23 01:00:51 1982 [GILBERT at MIT-XX (Ed Gilbert): Re: Moran's Comments] >From Admin.JQJ@SU-SCORE Tue Feb 23 00:03:08 1982 [ Editor's note: the previous message to editor-people (from decvax!duke!bsb@Berkeley) argues for one version of the history of the typewriter keyboard. Since this subject appeared on editor-people several months ago, I thought I might resend a message sketching an alternative perspective. /jqj ] ---------------

Mail-from: ARPANET site MIT-XX rcvd at 10-Dec-81 1630-PST Date: 10 Dec 1981 1928-EST From: GILBERT at MIT-XX (Ed Gilbert) Subject: Re: Moran's Comments To: Guy.Steele at CMU-10A, editor-people at SU-SCORE In-Reply-To: Your message of 9-Dec-81 2352-EST

I just want to comment on an aside you made in your message to editor-people. The QWERTY keyboard wasn't designed to slow people down.

I don't have my reference materials here so I must hedge the details, but here is what really happened:

In about the late 1870's Glidden and Sholes were working on a typewriter which would eventually evolve into the popular and long-lived Remington line. People operated the machine so quickly that the type bars would jam. They needed an arrangement of the type bar "basket" in which common sequences of two letters would have those two letters on opposite sides of the basket. In the most straightforward design of a manual typewriter this would have a direct effect on the keyboard layout, but they were interested in the type basket, not the keyboard. The brother of one of the two men, a high school principal, determined the arrangement.

I do not consider myself an expert on the history of the typewriter, but I believe this to be true. The only person I have talked to who has done a lot of reading on the subject also feels that this is the correct story.

It would seem that if all other variables were fixed and we only addressed the issue of whether two letter sequences appeared on the same or opposite side of the keyboard, then putting them on opposite sides would allow for faster typing. Other factors, such as which fingers type which keys, were probably not addressed at the time and may be the cause of the QWERTY keyboard's being slower than some other designs.

Sorry for the long note about a minor point, but the myth that Glidden and Sholes were trying to slow people down is rather widespread and I thought people might like to hear the true story.

By the way, it appears that touch typing was an invention; it didn't always exist. Its merits, in fact, were quite vigorously debated.

Ed Gilbert ------- -------

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