Why are keyboards QWERTY and not ABCDEF?

How the QWERTY Keyboard Came to Be.

The standard keyboard that we use today is known as a QWERTY keyboard. But have you ever wondered why it's called that? Or why the keys are arranged in that particular order? If you're a curious person, read on to find out the interesting story of how the QWERTY keyboard came to be!

The History of the QWERTY Keyboard.

The first thing to know is that the QWERTY keyboard is named after the six letters in the top-left corner of the keyboard (Q, W, E, R, T, Y). But where did those letters come from?

It turns out that the QWERTY keyboard was actually designed to slow down typists! In 1873, Christopher Latham Sholes patented the first mechanical typewriter. However, there was a problem with his design: the typebars (the metal arms that strike the paper to create letters) would often become jammed. To solve this problem, Sholes rearranged the alphabet on his keyboard so that commonly used letter combinations were far apart from each other. This new arrangement prevented typebar jams and made typing much easier.

Of course, once typewriters became widely used, there was no going back to the old way of arranging letters. And so, the QWERTY keyboard was born!

Why Do We Still Use QWERTY Keyboards Today?

If you're wondering why we still use QWERTY keyboards today even though they were designed over 150 years ago, it's because of something called "path dependency." This is when a person or organization gets stuck using a particular technology or method simply because they've been using it for so long. It's very difficult to break away from path dependence because it would require relearning how to do things in a new way—and who has time for that?

For example, think about how hard it would be to switch from a QWERTY keyboard to an ABCDEF keyboard if you've been using QWERTY your whole life. You would have to retrain your brain and your fingers to find all the letters in different places! Even though an ABCDEF keyboard might be more efficient (since it's based on alphabetical order), it would be much harder for everyone to switch over. As a result, we're likely stuck with QWERTY keyboards for many years to come.

Conclusion:

So there you have it—the fascinating story of how the QWERTY keyboard came to be! Who would have thought that such a commonplace object has such an interesting history behind it? Next time you're sitting at your computer typing away, take a moment to think about how different things could have been if Christopher Latham Sholes had never invented the typewriter—or if he had arranged the keys in a different order!