Typing skills.

[AUFred]

I am very lacking in typing skills. I am slow and plodding at best. I wish computers had been an option when I was in college. I typed several papers in college with an old manual typewriter. For those who have not had the pleasure it required a constant key stroke or some letters looked bolded while others barely showed. Corrections required an eraser & a brush or white-out. Later in college, I paid to have my papers typed by those who had self-correcting electric typewriters. Even with those the corrections were still obvious on the finished product.

We did not have a user friendly interface when we finally began using computers. It was years later before I was introduced to MS-DOS & windows 3.0.

 

[pjbleek]

My dad had a Royal typewriter and he loved it dearly. brought it home and allowed me to use it. the ribbons always needing replacing it seemed. eventually my sister bought him a Brother electronic typewriter (he hated it) I remember doing a paper in 8th grade using dad's old machine and the ribbon ran out and it was a Sunday. ( all the stores were closed, remember those days?) so had to finish the paper using red ink, my teacher was not pleased, but what could you do? yeah be a little prepared for this type (pardon the pun) of situation, but still I got it finished....

 

[AUFred]

On the old manuals you could rewind the ribbon and get a little more life out of them. I did that quite a few times too.

 

[HK]

I'm a little jealous of those who had typewriters - I was born slightly too late for that, though I did hand write everything when I was younger, and thought nothing of it.


These days, it's quicker for me to just type it down.

 

[NoDak]

I played, some, on an old Royal manual. In high school, we had the IBM Selectric typewriters. IMHO, they were the best thing for producing documents or letters. I averaged 40-45 WAM on one.

Due to the lack of use, my typing skills rather languished until we got a computer and I started joining online groups and forums. Some, with whom I chat, think I'm pretty fast. I don't. I just go along as fast as I can without making too many mustackz.

 

[jassilem]

I had an electric typewriter and it was pretty awesome.. then a computer a bit after that..

When I got to high school I just did all my papers at school and printed there.

 

[Kyle B]

Typewriters are horrible. I'll take my word processor.

 

[MoonOwl]

I was introduced to the manual typewriter in Jr. High typing class. Fun times. I've had (& PS also) conversations w/PBBB about what she has 'missed' being born in the technological age

My favourite electric typewriter was the IBM Selectric w/the wheels. circa 1980's. I even bought one from work for home use.

At that time, as an admin assist. for 30+ engineers, I was glad for the embrace of word processing. Makes life so much easier - even if it was Word Star 2000 at the time. Then came Word Perfect. Converting one doc to another proved challenging at times. Daisy-something pings in my mind as being a horrible conversion :ninja I've blocked it out almost entirely in time :cool

I still typed out envelopes on my Selectric tho I was sad when mine finally died. Now I write out envelopes to keep up my penmanship. My Grandmother could write perfectly horizontal lines of text on unlined paper. Usually chastising me for something.

Oh, the olde days...

 

[teh_fuzz]

Never willingly used an old school typewriter. I took a computer class as an elective in middle school but it was more of a fuck off class lol. Not until I started working at my current job did I bother learning to type, so I guess you can say I am still pretty new to it (about 9 yrs or so).

 

[Abcinthia]

My mum had a lovely type writer when I was a kid.

I absolutely loved typing on it.

 

[hart]

We had a manual typewriter and boy did you have to hit those keys hard to get them to register. Also, half the time the red bled into the black (the ribbon was half black and half red). But when I did finally take a typing class (with electric typewriters) I sure hit those keys hard.....still do actually

Funnily enuf I just had my Panasonic typewriter with Display mate fixed here at work. It has a bunch of addresses in it in memory which I use a lot on envelopes. I know, we have computer labels too but I sort of like my display mate.

 

[Jackass master]

Never developed any typing skills other than my 2 index fingers. They have worked for me for over 50 years so why tax the brain now.

 

[Natasha]

There are several tutorials and online tests you can use to help build up your typing skills if you're interested, Fred. I've been typing since I was in elementary school (on an old typewriter, then a word processor, and then a computer) and average around 100 wpm or so when I get going.

 

[Abcinthia]

Mavis Beacon is a good typing tutorial. It's what I learnt to touch type on.

 

[Kakapo Dundee]

All posts by the author known as Kakapo Dundee are lovingly created with the sole assistance of the left index finger.


[unless of course the shift key cannot be avoided]

 

[Siphorous]

I'm not a high speed typer, but I do ok when I need. I learnt to touch type as I went along really, a by-product of my career choices many years ago (software dev).

The one thing it took me a while to figure out regarding the old manual type writers is why there was no '1' key. Of course, I know now

 

[Abcinthia]

The one thing it took me a while to figure out regarding the old manual type writers is why there was no '1' key. Of course, I know now

Do you have to use a capital I instead and an O instead of 0?

A lot of new books I've been reading are set in an old-style typeface and use Is and Os for 1 and 0.

 

[Siphorous]

Do you have to use a capital I instead and an O instead of 0?

A lot of new books I've been reading are set in an old-style typeface and use Is and Os for 1 and 0.

It was a lower case L for 1 and for 0 - I don't think that key was missing from memory anyways. I guess the L lower case was used as it shared the same typeface.

 

[Kyle B]

Do you have to use a capital I instead and an O instead of 0?

A lot of new books I've been reading are set in an old-style typeface and use Is and Os for 1 and 0.

I hear that for exclamation points, they used to put an l and then go back and put a period lol

 

[Abcinthia]

I think that's so cool.