-----Original Message----- From: Ben Finney
>> This is an often-repeated myth, with citations back as far as the 1970s. >> It is false. >> The design is intended to reduce jamming the print heads together, but the >> goal of this is not to reduce speed, but to enable *fast* typing. >> It aims to maximise the frequency in which (English-language) text has >> consecutive letters alternating either side of the middle of the keyboard. >> This should thus reduce collisions of nearby heads — and hence >> *increase* the effective typing speed that can be achieved on such a >> mechanical typewriter. When I was in high school, mid-70s, the instructor, an elderly women, said the same thing, the placement of the keys were designed to minimize collision of the heads. I don't remember what she called the various parts, but they all had technical names. I vaguely remember hearing the myth of slowing down typists when Dvorak's keyboard became available for PCs, '80s(?), and that this 'new' layout removed that incumbrance. -- https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
