
The core section of a keyboard consists of character keys, which can be used to type letters and other characters. However, differences between national layouts are mostly due to different selections and placements of symbols on the character keys. There is some variation between different keyboard models in the physical layout-i.e., how many keys there are and how they are positioned on the keyboard. 6.3.2.2.2 Russian QWERTY/QWERTZ-based phonetic layoutsĪ typical 105-key computer keyboard, consisting of sections with different types of keys.Ī computer keyboard consists of alphanumeric or character keys for typing, modifier keys for altering the functions of other keys, navigation keys for moving the text cursor on the screen, function keys and system command keys-such as Esc and Break-for special actions, and often a numeric keypad to facilitate calculations.6 Keyboard layouts for non-Latin alphabetic scripts.5.17 Other original layouts and layout design software.5.16 Chorded keyboards and mobile devices.3 Physical, visual, and functional layouts.1.3.6 Menu key, Command key, Windows key.Some settings enable the user to type supplementary symbols which are not engraved on the keys used to invoke them. Thus the symbol shown on the physical key-top need not be the same as appears on the screen or goes into a document being typed. In addition, software may be available to modify or extend keyboard functionality. Often, a user can change keyboard mapping in system settings. This means that a physical keyboard may be dynamically mapped to any layout without switching hardware components-merely by changing the software that interprets the keystrokes. The OS converts the scancode into a specific binary character code using a "scancode to character" conversion table, called the keyboard mapping table.


Modern computer keyboards are designed to send a scancode to the operating system (OS) when a key is pressed or released: this code reports only the key's row and column, not the specific character engraved on that key. Functional layout is the arrangement of the key-meaning association or keyboard mapping, determined in software, of all the keys of a keyboard: it is this (rather than the legends) that determines the actual response to a key press. Visual layout is the arrangement of the legends (labels, markings, engravings) that appear on those keys. Physical layout is the actual positioning of keys on a keyboard.

A keyboard layout is any specific physical, visual or functional arrangement of the keys, legends, or key-meaning associations (respectively) of a computer keyboard, mobile phone, or other computer-controlled typographic keyboard.
