LK421
Encyclopedia
Digital Equipment Corporation
Digital Equipment Corporation was a major American company in the computer industry and a leading vendor of computer systems, software and peripherals from the 1960s to the 1990s...
of Maynard
Maynard, Massachusetts
Maynard is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. As of the 2010 census, the town population was 10,106.- History :Maynard, located on the Assabet River, was incorporated as an independent municipality in 1871. Prior to that it was known as 'Assabet Village' but was legally...
, Massachusetts
Massachusetts
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...
and supplied as an option to the standard LK401 keyboard with their DECstation
DECstation
The DECstation was a brand of computers used by DEC, and refers to three distinct lines of computer systems—the first released in 1978 as a word processing system, and the latter two both released in 1989. These comprised a range of computer workstations based on the MIPS architecture and a...
workstations. The keyboard is optimized for use with the Digital Unix line of operating systems, instead of the OpenVMS
OpenVMS
OpenVMS , previously known as VAX-11/VMS, VAX/VMS or VMS, is a computer server operating system that runs on VAX, Alpha and Itanium-based families of computers. Contrary to what its name suggests, OpenVMS is not open source software; however, the source listings are available for purchase...
operating system for which the LK401 was more suitable.
The keyboard is notable for the standard position of the Control key
Control key
In computing, a Control key is a modifier key which, when pressed in conjunction with another key, will perform a special operation ; similar to the Shift key, the Control key rarely performs any function when pressed by itself...
for use with Unix
Unix
Unix is a multitasking, multi-user computer operating system originally developed in 1969 by a group of AT&T employees at Bell Labs, including Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, Brian Kernighan, Douglas McIlroy, and Joe Ossanna...
operating systems and an Escape key. The keyboard has two Compose Key
Compose key
A compose key, available on some computer keyboards, is a special kind of modifier key designated to signal the software to interpret the following sequence of two keystrokes as a combination in order to produce a character not found directly on the keyboard...
s. There is no separate numeric keypad or edit key group. The functionality of the missing keys is implemented by some standard keys having a dual function. The user holds down the Extend key and presses the key with the appropriate legend on the front of a standard key to access the additional functions.