KEYBOARD and IMPORTANT KEYS

KEYBOARD The keyboard is the device containing all the buttons or keys with letters, numbers and other symbols on them. This is one of the main mechanisms you will use to enter information into the computer.

The Enter Key (also called 'return') This is one of the most important keys. You will press this after you have finished typing in a piece of information to tell the computer that it must go ahead and process that information.

The Shift Key This key usually gives another key a different meaning. if you press 'Shift' and then a letter key at the same time, you will type a capital letter instead of a lower-case letter. If you use it at the same time as a number key, you will type the symbol you see on the keyboard above the numbers. The same goes for the punctuation and other keys with two symbols on them.

The Caps Lock key Press the 'Caps Lock' key on the left of your keyboard once and everything you type after that will be in capital letters. Press it again and you will be typing in lower-case letters again.

The Numeric Lock Key With the numeric lock function switched on, you will type numbers when you use the keypad.

 The Tab Key The 'tab' key moves the cursor to the next significant place. The tab key will move the cursor to the next field If pressed together with 'shift', will move it to the previous field. In a word processor it will create a space larger than if you hit the spacebar.

The Backspace Key This key is used for deleting text. Press it once and the cursor will move one space backwards, deleting the previous letter.

The Arrow Keys These four keys are used for moving the cursor around on a page. The arrow on each key indicates the direction in which the cursor will move.

The Delete Key The 'delete' key is used in a number of ways. In a word processor, it will delete the letter in front of the cursor or the sections that are highlighted. In Windows Explorer (explained later) it will delete whatever files are selected by sending them to the Recycle Bin. Selecting an icon and hitting 'delete' will send it to the Recycle Bin.

The Home and End Keys These are most commonly used in word processors. 'Home' will take you to the beginning of the line in which you are typing. 'End' will take you to the end of that line.

The Page up and Page down Keys The 'Page Up' and 'Page Down' keys show the next section in the window in which you are working. You can use these instead of scrolling.