Using both the CTRL and META keys. "The command to burn all LEDs is
double bucky F."
This term originated on the Stanford extended-ASCII keyboard, and was
later taken up by users of the {space-cadet keyboard} at MIT. A
typical MIT comment was that the Stanford {bucky bits} (control and
meta shifting keys) were nice, but there weren't enough of them; you
could type only 512 different characters on a Stanford keyboard. An
obvious way to address this was simply to add more shifting keys, and
this was eventually done; but a keyboard with that many shifting keys
is hard on touch-typists, who don't like to move their hands away
from the home position on the keyboard. It was half-seriously
suggested that the extra shifting keys be implemented as pedals;
typing on such a keyboard would be very much like playing a full pipe
organ. This idea is mentioned in a parody of a very fine song by
Jeffrey Moss called Rubber Duckie, which was published in The Sesame
Street Songbook (Simon and Schuster 1971, ISBN 0-671-21036-X). These
lyrics were written on May 27, 1978, in celebration of the Stanford
keyboard:
Double Bucky
Double bucky, you're the one!
You make my keyboard lots of fun.
Double bucky, an additional bit or two:
(Vo-vo-de-o!)
Control and meta, side by side,
Augmented ASCII, nine bits wide!
Double bucky! Half a thousand glyphs, plus a few!
Oh,
I sure wish that I
Had a couple of
Bits more!
Perhaps a
Set of pedals to
Make the number of
Bits four:
Double double bucky!
Double bucky, left and right
OR'd together, outta sight!
Double bucky, I'd like a whole word of
Double bucky, I'm happy I heard of
Double bucky, I'd like a whole word of you!
-- The Great Quux (with apologies to Jeffrey Moss)
[This, by the way, is an excellent example of computer {filk} --ESR]
See also {meta bit}, {cokebottle}, and {quadruple bucky}.
[glossary]
[Reference(s) to this entry by made by: {bucky bits}{filk}{quadruple bucky}{space-cadet keyboard}]