No divide key on my keyboard

Zen8

Zen8

Zen8

Associate
Joined
5 Nov 2003
Posts
293
Location
UK
Call me stupid, but I’ve only just noticed. Are all keyboards the same or is it just mine? Or is there a way of making the divide sign, using other keys?
 
Use the forward slash key? Like this?: 8 / 2 = 4. Why isn’t there a conventional divide sign key? Are all keyboards the same?
 
Mike_T said:
Use the forward slash key? Like this?: 8 / 2 = 4. Why isn’t there a conventional divide sign key? Are all keyboards the same?
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Erm, all keyboards are the same. When I right divide I do / unless its on a peice of sqaured paper...
 
Concorde Rules said:
Erm, all keyboards are the same. When I right divide I do / unless its on a peice of sqaured paper...
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Okay, thanks.

US-International has one:

540px-KB_US-International.svg.png


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keyboard_layout
 
Its been a 'feature' of computers since... since there were computers? I think the BBC Microcomputer had a divide sine, but very few computers do

/ = divide
* = multiply
 
Not many american keyboards have the divide sign, my laptop don't though and that is an american keyboard, but I don't see why though as in any programming language like Basic, Pascal, C++ , the computer only understands the use of the / slash key as a division, even going back to the C64's, speccy and Amiga it has always been a / to represent the divide and not the symbol used in maths.

Anthony
 
Concorde Rules said:
Erm, all keyboards are the same. When I right divide I do / unless its on a peice of sqaured paper...
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So Russian and Chinese keyboards use the same layout? And Dvorak ones? What about Japanese laptop keyboards? ;)
 
mosfet said:
So Russian and Chinese keyboards use the same layout? And Dvorak ones? What about Japanese laptop keyboards? ;)
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Well presumably for numeric operations yes. The alphabets and layouts may vary(American layout sucks for instance, half-height return and backslash right above it as two points) but generally numbers are numbers throughout the world since not too many people use Roman Numerals anymore ;)

Anyway I'm using an American(Canadian) keyboard and it doesn't have a divide symbol other than the ordinary / and US International layout is like US English - it shouldn't exist, there is a perfectly good "English" English if only people cared to use it ;)
 
Energize said:
Why is a * symbol used to represent x ? Ive never seen * in any maths textbook.
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At a guess because x (the letter) is used in equations as well and it is a lot simpler than typing an italicised x so it helps to avoid confusion plus early computers didn't have different fonts or formatting to aid recognition. This could all be total mince of course but it makes reasonable sense to me, other than that it could be because it was the most obvious symbol available.
 
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