Wax nostalgic about and learn from the history of early electronics.
See articles from Electronics,
published 1930 - 1988. All copyrights hereby acknowledged.
RF Cafe visitor Rick M. was kind enough to send me this
message and info re the TYPIT® product:
"Years ago you posted about Typit, these accessories for
typing scientific characters. My father was a physics prof and academic dean at
a small college in Kansas, which apparently made him a prospective customer for
them. In Dad's papers I found their materials and a sample Typit. Just thought
you might be interested."
Turns out using them is different that what I had envisioned,
involving replacing keys. It is actually a very convenient scheme with no key
replacement required.
If you are typing on your
computer or phone (which is actually more of a computer than a phone) and you need
to create a character other than the standard keyboard set, most programs provide
a means to access extended characters either with a menu selection or an ability
to enter ASCII extended character set
codes into the source code. At most, it takes a couple additional keystrokes (assuming
you know how to do it). Back in the days of typewriters, the task was nowhere near
as easy. Some manufacturers of typewriters had replaceable balls for allowing
a variety of
typefaces and fonts, often including one with special science
and engineering characters. Those required the typist to reserve space on the
page for the characters,
swap out the ball, then go back and fill in the blanks. It was tedious and error-prone.
There is often a noticeable shift in the character baseline compared to all the
rest in the line.
The Mechanical Enterprises company produced an add-on gadget called the TYPIT that
needed to be attached to the typewriter and allowed interchangeable character die
to be quickly inserted and removed as the need required. More than a thousand characters
were available.
See page 7 of this document for a little more info on
TYPIT.
TYPIT® is the perfect way to type any technical, foreign or numerical symbol
-- easy as π. Over 1,000 symbols like
to choose from. A standard
typewriter is all you need. It is clean, inexpensive and fast
Type Any Symbol perfectly in 4 seconds
Write today for free catalog
TYPIT® manufactured by Mechanical Enterprises, Inc.
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to choose from. A standard
typewriter is all you need. It is clean, inexpensive and fast 