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Douglas Kerr of Bell Labs holds US Patent 3,569,991 on a alpha-only shift lock key. Filed March 20, 1968 & assigned to his employer, Bell Labs. https://patents.google.com/patent/US3569991A/en?oq=US3569991— Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.79.70.131 ( talk) 15:48, 20 March 2022 (UTC)
The fact that using the caps lock on Internet forums and in other electronic communications could be considered rude or as shouting by the recipients should be included here. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.69.198.243 ( talk) 11:17, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
yes, this should be included — Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.170.86.132 ( talk) 15:00, 12 October 2016 (UTC)
Really? Declared by who? Someone tell me so I can punch him in the face. 85.24.168.123 ( talk) 22:21, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
Why is the caps lock button written as "caps lock" or sometimes "Caps Lock"? It should have spelled CAPS LOCK just as the title of this article. People do not have respect for the interplay between semantics and form nowadays... 217.77.157.57 ( talk) 13:01, 28 June 2013 (UTC)
What can you do if your caps lock key is sticking?If any ones looking at this ,tell me!
caps lock aint important...GET A MAC
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Caps lock day? I think this should be removed from the entry. It is only listed in a couple small blogs and appears to be more of a silly prank... Jebba 06:28, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
can someone please tell me why you can't just select text and then hit Caps Lock to either capitalize or decapitalize letters the same way you'd Bold or Underline something??? how many times have you typed something not realizeing the caps lock was on and then had to delete it and retype it. it's obnoxious. come on gates.... come on jobs..... this seems so easy!
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That "The caps lock is a key on a computer keyboard" is a historical coincidence- they happened to be on mechanical typewriters and ended up on computer keyboards where they hardly ever fulfilled a function. Maybe that should be mentioned. Spogelse 12:33, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
the last guy whO EDITED THe page has a sense of humor... REVERTED! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sick&ridiculous ( talk • contribs) 00:29, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
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There are known groups of people whose Internet communities are based entirely around the use of the caps lock key.
- shouldn't there be some citation or examples or links to such communities? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.169.20.217 ( talk) 18:34, 6 July 2008 (UTC)
shouldn't there be some citation or examples or links to such communities?
I added one. Shouldn't there be some citation or examples or links giving evidence of the supposed 'Caps Lock Theory'? 99.130.38.50 ( talk) 20:38, 14 October 2008 (UTC)
The main article could be improved considerably if there were some discussion of the actual lever mechanism underneath the Shift Lock of the Commodore 64, or the Caps Lock of the IBM Selectric typewriter. Unlike modern PC keyboards, it behaved like the Shift-Lock or Caps Lock of 1970s and 1980s typewriters: the first time you pressed it, it went down, and entered into a latched position. It won't come up again - not even if you accidentally brush against it - until you deliberately press it a second time. Some of us consider this preferable to what passes for keyboards nowadays.
To illustrate this, somebody ought to post a picture of the latching mechanism under the caps lock (that is, shift lock) keys. 198.177.27.23 ( talk) 07:47, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
With spelling mistakes and a non-verifiable reference - Tom Williams's articles appear to not include 'Yarrr ye pirates be scurvy dogs' - I'd say this section can be safely removed. alagahd ( talk) 01:34, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
One of the differences between whether or not the letters become lowercase if the Shift key is pressed happens to make it lowercase on a PC, while a Mac remains capitalized. I haven't used a Mac in 18 months, though. Mechamind90 ( talk) 20:42, 17 November 2009 (UTC)
I mean, what was the REASON this was included on computer keyboards at the end of the 1970s at all? Except for politicians and government, these things are never decided without a reason. I'd even dare assume that this key WAS useful once, with ancient terminals. But when exactly, this would interest the reader. Pity there's nothing found anywhere about these facts. -andy 212.114.254.107 ( talk) 15:15, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
My workplace requires filenames in ALL CAPS, but outgoing emails in Standard English Capitalization. I get mixed up at least two dozen times each week, and accidentally START TYPING WRONG. (backspace, backspace, backspace...) I would love to have a utility where I could select a batch of text I've already typed, and hit Shift-Caps to invert mY aCCIDENTAL cAPITALIZATION. Ctrl-Caps could make the entirety of a selection toggle between all-caps and lowercase. Alt-Caps could put a pre-defined filter, such as making the first letter of each sentence a capital, and the rest lowercase; this could be switched depending on the language of the user. I can see this being as subtle and expected a behavior of operating systems ten years hence as hover behavior has become today. However, somebody has to be the innovator; as the inventor of this idea, I hereby license it freely for use by all. Get to work, penguins! -- BlueNight ( talk) 02:34, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
Good idea :D
Not appropriate for a wikipedia talk page, but good idea :) Veggieburgerfish ( talk) 16:33, 29 May 2010 (UTC)
Isn't the caps lock something that can prevent you using the cursor key on some computers? Or am I thinking of something else which locks computer keys? ACEOREVIVED ( talk) 21:09, 5 May 2011 (UTC)
Saw this in the article.
Uh, really? In my experience every computer I've ever seen has both a shift key and a caps lock. Since I'm not sure where the author was coming from with this statement I'll just leave this here instead of editing it out. -- 121.223.137.109 ( talk) 18:31, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
On PC keyboards, the key often comes with a funny step shape, unique on the keyboard. I am surprised the article has not addressed this.
I researched this in the past, and discovered the step was added to the key so that it was harder for a user to hit the key by accident (when hitting the 'A' or 'Shift' keys). I am sure there must be some good references for this somewhere, but I don't have time to search today. Cheers. -- 175.143.9.56 ( talk) 03:45, 6 November 2014 (UTC)
cLUMSY TYPISTS LIKE ME OFTEN HIT THE "cAPS lOCK" KEY BY MISTAKE. tHE RESULT infuriates ME, AND i WASTE SIGNIFICANT TIME CORRECTING IT, USUALLY BY RETYPING. (tHOUGH nOTEPAD2 AND ms wORD, oUTLOOK, ETC. HAVE A "TOGGLE CASE" COMMAND, IF YOU CAN FIND IT.) Accidentally hitting the "Insert" key creates a different kind of disaster (accidental erasure by "overtyping"). tHE "cAPS lOCK" KEY AND THE "iNSERT" KEY ARE almost never useful.
After experiencing enough negative incidents caused by the near-useless "Caps Lock" and "Insert" keys, a smart typist learns to pry them off and toss them in a drawer (for optional restoration someday). (Hesitate: Laptop keys often cannot be put back.) (On the rare occasion that a removed key can briefly be useful, it can still be operated with a small object such as the back of a ballpoint pen.) If valuing function above form ("defacement") is not acceptable, an alternative might be a keyboard utility configured to ignore the near-useless keys until they are held down for 800ms (or pressed multiple times), and acknowledge them with a beep and/or screen pop-up. (Now find a "reliable source" that "noteworthably" advises either of these.) - A876 ( talk) 20:45, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
![]() | This article is rated C-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | ||||||||||
|
Douglas Kerr of Bell Labs holds US Patent 3,569,991 on a alpha-only shift lock key. Filed March 20, 1968 & assigned to his employer, Bell Labs. https://patents.google.com/patent/US3569991A/en?oq=US3569991— Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.79.70.131 ( talk) 15:48, 20 March 2022 (UTC)
The fact that using the caps lock on Internet forums and in other electronic communications could be considered rude or as shouting by the recipients should be included here. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.69.198.243 ( talk) 11:17, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
yes, this should be included — Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.170.86.132 ( talk) 15:00, 12 October 2016 (UTC)
Really? Declared by who? Someone tell me so I can punch him in the face. 85.24.168.123 ( talk) 22:21, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
Why is the caps lock button written as "caps lock" or sometimes "Caps Lock"? It should have spelled CAPS LOCK just as the title of this article. People do not have respect for the interplay between semantics and form nowadays... 217.77.157.57 ( talk) 13:01, 28 June 2013 (UTC)
What can you do if your caps lock key is sticking?If any ones looking at this ,tell me!
caps lock aint important...GET A MAC
---
Caps lock day? I think this should be removed from the entry. It is only listed in a couple small blogs and appears to be more of a silly prank... Jebba 06:28, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
can someone please tell me why you can't just select text and then hit Caps Lock to either capitalize or decapitalize letters the same way you'd Bold or Underline something??? how many times have you typed something not realizeing the caps lock was on and then had to delete it and retype it. it's obnoxious. come on gates.... come on jobs..... this seems so easy!
---
That "The caps lock is a key on a computer keyboard" is a historical coincidence- they happened to be on mechanical typewriters and ended up on computer keyboards where they hardly ever fulfilled a function. Maybe that should be mentioned. Spogelse 12:33, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
the last guy whO EDITED THe page has a sense of humor... REVERTED! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sick&ridiculous ( talk • contribs) 00:29, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
---
There are known groups of people whose Internet communities are based entirely around the use of the caps lock key.
- shouldn't there be some citation or examples or links to such communities? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.169.20.217 ( talk) 18:34, 6 July 2008 (UTC)
shouldn't there be some citation or examples or links to such communities?
I added one. Shouldn't there be some citation or examples or links giving evidence of the supposed 'Caps Lock Theory'? 99.130.38.50 ( talk) 20:38, 14 October 2008 (UTC)
The main article could be improved considerably if there were some discussion of the actual lever mechanism underneath the Shift Lock of the Commodore 64, or the Caps Lock of the IBM Selectric typewriter. Unlike modern PC keyboards, it behaved like the Shift-Lock or Caps Lock of 1970s and 1980s typewriters: the first time you pressed it, it went down, and entered into a latched position. It won't come up again - not even if you accidentally brush against it - until you deliberately press it a second time. Some of us consider this preferable to what passes for keyboards nowadays.
To illustrate this, somebody ought to post a picture of the latching mechanism under the caps lock (that is, shift lock) keys. 198.177.27.23 ( talk) 07:47, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
With spelling mistakes and a non-verifiable reference - Tom Williams's articles appear to not include 'Yarrr ye pirates be scurvy dogs' - I'd say this section can be safely removed. alagahd ( talk) 01:34, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
One of the differences between whether or not the letters become lowercase if the Shift key is pressed happens to make it lowercase on a PC, while a Mac remains capitalized. I haven't used a Mac in 18 months, though. Mechamind90 ( talk) 20:42, 17 November 2009 (UTC)
I mean, what was the REASON this was included on computer keyboards at the end of the 1970s at all? Except for politicians and government, these things are never decided without a reason. I'd even dare assume that this key WAS useful once, with ancient terminals. But when exactly, this would interest the reader. Pity there's nothing found anywhere about these facts. -andy 212.114.254.107 ( talk) 15:15, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
My workplace requires filenames in ALL CAPS, but outgoing emails in Standard English Capitalization. I get mixed up at least two dozen times each week, and accidentally START TYPING WRONG. (backspace, backspace, backspace...) I would love to have a utility where I could select a batch of text I've already typed, and hit Shift-Caps to invert mY aCCIDENTAL cAPITALIZATION. Ctrl-Caps could make the entirety of a selection toggle between all-caps and lowercase. Alt-Caps could put a pre-defined filter, such as making the first letter of each sentence a capital, and the rest lowercase; this could be switched depending on the language of the user. I can see this being as subtle and expected a behavior of operating systems ten years hence as hover behavior has become today. However, somebody has to be the innovator; as the inventor of this idea, I hereby license it freely for use by all. Get to work, penguins! -- BlueNight ( talk) 02:34, 15 May 2010 (UTC)
Good idea :D
Not appropriate for a wikipedia talk page, but good idea :) Veggieburgerfish ( talk) 16:33, 29 May 2010 (UTC)
Isn't the caps lock something that can prevent you using the cursor key on some computers? Or am I thinking of something else which locks computer keys? ACEOREVIVED ( talk) 21:09, 5 May 2011 (UTC)
Saw this in the article.
Uh, really? In my experience every computer I've ever seen has both a shift key and a caps lock. Since I'm not sure where the author was coming from with this statement I'll just leave this here instead of editing it out. -- 121.223.137.109 ( talk) 18:31, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
On PC keyboards, the key often comes with a funny step shape, unique on the keyboard. I am surprised the article has not addressed this.
I researched this in the past, and discovered the step was added to the key so that it was harder for a user to hit the key by accident (when hitting the 'A' or 'Shift' keys). I am sure there must be some good references for this somewhere, but I don't have time to search today. Cheers. -- 175.143.9.56 ( talk) 03:45, 6 November 2014 (UTC)
cLUMSY TYPISTS LIKE ME OFTEN HIT THE "cAPS lOCK" KEY BY MISTAKE. tHE RESULT infuriates ME, AND i WASTE SIGNIFICANT TIME CORRECTING IT, USUALLY BY RETYPING. (tHOUGH nOTEPAD2 AND ms wORD, oUTLOOK, ETC. HAVE A "TOGGLE CASE" COMMAND, IF YOU CAN FIND IT.) Accidentally hitting the "Insert" key creates a different kind of disaster (accidental erasure by "overtyping"). tHE "cAPS lOCK" KEY AND THE "iNSERT" KEY ARE almost never useful.
After experiencing enough negative incidents caused by the near-useless "Caps Lock" and "Insert" keys, a smart typist learns to pry them off and toss them in a drawer (for optional restoration someday). (Hesitate: Laptop keys often cannot be put back.) (On the rare occasion that a removed key can briefly be useful, it can still be operated with a small object such as the back of a ballpoint pen.) If valuing function above form ("defacement") is not acceptable, an alternative might be a keyboard utility configured to ignore the near-useless keys until they are held down for 800ms (or pressed multiple times), and acknowledge them with a beep and/or screen pop-up. (Now find a "reliable source" that "noteworthably" advises either of these.) - A876 ( talk) 20:45, 30 March 2021 (UTC)