Bell & Howell Micromodule 85 : info wanted

From: Philip.Belben_at_pgen.com <(Philip.Belben_at_pgen.com)>
Date: Thu Aug 19 05:48:36 1999

Sorry to revive such an old thread, but I've only just caught up with list
traffic since I went away...

>> > > 4 5 8 C W R
>> > > 3 6 9 D P D
>> > > 2 7 A E L S
>> > > 1 0 B F X B
>> > > -------------- ------
>> >
>> > Hmmmm... kinda neat if you're programming in Octal all the time...
>> > then the layout gets almost, dare I use the word: 'ergonomic'.....?
>>
>> Aha! That makes perfect sense. Good eye.
>
> Well, it might if either the 4/3/2/1 and the 5/6/7/0 columns were in the
> same order. ... but ... what's that 0 doing "after" the 7? In short,
> I don't see it is vaguely appropriate for octal, either :)

I don't much like 0 after 7, any more than I like 0 after 9 on a telephone dial
(or keypad for that matter).

But the layout above does give the digits 0 to 7 around a (non-circular) ring,
so I think it would work for octal.

I would have preferred either:

C D E F
8 9 A B
4 5 6 7
0 1 2 3

which is a good octal and hex keypad, or:

7 8 9 F
4 5 6 E
1 2 3 D
0 A B C

which incorporates the usual calculator pad.

Anyone else have preferred layouts?

Philip.
Received on Thu Aug 19 1999 - 05:48:36 BST