Hit or Press a key?

jerryte · Posted: Wed Sep 14, 2011 10:33 pm

Most instructions that I have read on how to do something on a computer will say to "hit" a key - example "hit Enter to start the program". I find this strange. To hit something is to strike a blow or to use force. Since computers are an electronic tool it is not advisable to hit the keyboard.

It makes more sense to "press" a key. Nice and gentle. No violence required. Your computer would thank you if it could.

superk · Posted: Wed Sep 14, 2011 10:46 pm

I agree, I've always found it strange to state it that way. I also find the instruction to "depress the <whatever> key" a bit odd, since I'm not aware that keys even have feelings, and are prone to being depressed.

Press. Easy. Accurate. Simple.

Bill Woodger · Posted: Thu Sep 15, 2011 12:16 am

I think if something is not working, you "hit" the key (hoping that it might produce a different result this time), else you "press" it.

I think you also "hit" the keys (RESET and ENTER alternately) when the system inexplicably dies as you were saving your code.

Can't say the "hitting" ever worked, just released some tension. In the second case, you then get paper and pencil and start writing, hoping that either the system doesn't come back (with ENTER TSO-ID....) before you have finished, or that someone invents "emulation" (and the PC) and you can do a screen-print to the clipboard before it does.

Ed Goodman · Active Member Joined: 08 Jun 2011 Posts: 556 Location: USA

hehe, someone just told me the test region would be down all day today, and I asked them if there was anything I could do to cheer it up.

dick scherrer · Posted: Thu Sep 15, 2011 1:00 am

I don't know about "hitting" or "(de)pressing" keys, but one day years ago, a co-worker set the record for the indoor terminal toss. . .

vasanthz · Posted: Thu Sep 15, 2011 12:21 pm

chuck norris was playing with lego bricks & invented computers, it was earlier called as 'round-house kick the key', later for mere humans it was 'hit the key'.

PeterHolland · Posted: Thu Sep 15, 2011 12:28 pm

Of course the typewriter was the predecessor of the keyboard.
With a typewriter you really had to hit the keys, so my guess is that
"hitting keys" is inherited from the use of typewriters.

Beside that a lot of musicians are hittting their keyboards, and last but not
least people fooling around in their nose will have to hit the keys hard to get any movement in them.

Bill Woodger · Posted: Mon Sep 26, 2011 10:16 pm

From a news item, fair use and all that sort of stuff.

From a story about the idea of a bunch of monkeys randomly typing being able to produce a clean copy of the entire works of Shakespeare, given infinite monkeys and infinite time.

"Also in 2003, Paignton Zoo carried out a practical test by putting a keyboard connected to a PC into the cage of six crested macaques. After a month the monkeys had produced five pages of the letter "S" and had broken the keyboard."

Obviously they were hitting the keys, or at least the S key.

I think, but can't confirm because the posting is archived, that the macaques actually posted a query here, asking how it could be done "in JCL", in one step only, without using ICETOOL.

I have to say, given the whole keyboard to aim at, producing five pages of only the letter S sounds impressive. Then I remembered auto-repeat. Now I suspect some nostril-work, letter-S thus permanently stuck for a period of time (I haven't done any testing to estimate how long). No food forthcoming, so bust the keyboard.

jerryte · Posted: Mon Sep 26, 2011 10:40 pm

We need a redneck to invent a keyboard that you shoot at. This might make computing more fun but would unfortunately thin the ranks of programmers from the occasional errant misfire. I wonder what the odds are of producing a shakespeare play by using a full auto mini gun.

Craq Giegerich · Posted: Mon Sep 26, 2011 10:43 pm