Post by mikkh on May 29, 2021 11:04:47 GMT
Having just replaced the missing ESC key top on my mechanical keyboard (£4.50 on eBay - bargain!)
I glanced at the key underneath (left of the 1 key) and tried to think of anytime I'd actually used that key, it's got 3 symbols and I can't remember needing anyone of them, ever.
So I started looking round for others who weren't earning their keep.
Capslock is the obvious one, never use it, but I've seen several people press it to get capital letters, then press it again to go back to lower case!
Scroll lock is an interesting one, apparently it does have a modern-day usage in spreadsheets, but it's a throwback to bygone DOS days for most of us
Pause/break - don't think I've ever pressed that one either
Hash key (next to enter/return) Not totally redundant, but so rarely used it might as well be. I know our American friends use it to mean number, but it's not a convention we follow here in the UK
Windows (or often called 'super' key in Linux) It's basic use is to bring up the menu, but it's a habit I've never got into, preferring to use the mouse instead. It does feature more in Windows shortcuts ( Windows key + R and many more) but for me it's another dead key.
The whole number pad - it's just an extra bit to the keyboard I never go to, even when I do a ALT-CTRL-DEL command, I use the other DEL key.
You can get keyboards without a number pad and they're called "tenkeyless" for some strange reason, they should be called "seventeenkeyless" to be more accurate (count them, you know you want to !)
I glanced at the key underneath (left of the 1 key) and tried to think of anytime I'd actually used that key, it's got 3 symbols and I can't remember needing anyone of them, ever.
So I started looking round for others who weren't earning their keep.
Capslock is the obvious one, never use it, but I've seen several people press it to get capital letters, then press it again to go back to lower case!
Scroll lock is an interesting one, apparently it does have a modern-day usage in spreadsheets, but it's a throwback to bygone DOS days for most of us
Pause/break - don't think I've ever pressed that one either
Hash key (next to enter/return) Not totally redundant, but so rarely used it might as well be. I know our American friends use it to mean number, but it's not a convention we follow here in the UK
Windows (or often called 'super' key in Linux) It's basic use is to bring up the menu, but it's a habit I've never got into, preferring to use the mouse instead. It does feature more in Windows shortcuts ( Windows key + R and many more) but for me it's another dead key.
The whole number pad - it's just an extra bit to the keyboard I never go to, even when I do a ALT-CTRL-DEL command, I use the other DEL key.
You can get keyboards without a number pad and they're called "tenkeyless" for some strange reason, they should be called "seventeenkeyless" to be more accurate (count them, you know you want to !)
