QWERTZ Swiss
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The QWERTZ ( ) QWERTZU ( ), or QWERTZUIOP
keyboard Keyboard may refer to: Text input * Keyboard, part of a typewriter * Computer keyboard ** Keyboard layout, the software control of computer keyboards and their mapping ** Keyboard technology, computer keyboard hardware and firmware Music * Mus ...
is a
typewriter A typewriter is a Machine, mechanical or electromechanical machine for typing characters. Typically, a typewriter has an array of Button (control), keys, and each one causes a different single character to be produced on paper by striking an i ...
and
keyboard layout 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. Standard keybo ...
widely used in Central and
Southeast Europe Southeast Europe or Southeastern Europe is a geographical sub-region of Europe, consisting primarily of the region of the Balkans, as well as adjacent regions and Archipelago, archipelagos. There are overlapping and conflicting definitions of t ...
. The name comes from the first six letters at the top left of the keyboard: ( ).


Overview

The main difference between QWERTZ and
QWERTY QWERTY ( ) is a keyboard layout for Latin-script alphabets. The name comes from the order of the first six Computer keyboard keys#Types, keys on the top letter row of the keyboard: . The QWERTY design is based on a layout included in the Sh ...
is that the positions of the and keys are switched (hence the nickname "kezboard"). This change possibly was made for three major reasons: * is a much more common letter than in German; the latter appears only in
loanword A loanword (also a loan word, loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language (the recipient or target language), through the process of borrowing. Borrowing is a metaphorical term t ...
s (mainly from
Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...
) and in proper names such as
Meyer Meyer may refer to: People *Meyer (surname), listing people so named * Meyer (name), a list of people and fictional characters with the name Companies * Meyer Burger, a Swiss mechanical engineering company * Meyer Corporation * Meyer Sound Labo ...
(alongside Meier and various other variants). * and often appear next to each other in the
German orthography German orthography is the orthography used in writing the German language, which is largely phonemic. However, it shows many instances of spellings that are historic or analogous to other spellings rather than phonemic. The pronunciation of al ...
, and typewriter jamming would be reduced by placing the two keys so they could be typed with separate hands. * and are also next to each other. , meaning "to" in German, and also a very common prefix can also be written very easily. Similar to many other non-English keyboards: * Part of the keyboard is adapted to include language-specific characters, e.g. umlauted vowels (''ä'', ''ö'', ''ü'') in German, Austrian, and Swiss (German) keyboards; and frequently used accented letters (é, è, à) in Swiss (French) keyboards. * QWERTZ keyboards usually change the right key into an key to access a third level of key assignments. This is necessary because the language-specific characters leave no room to have all the special symbols of
ASCII ASCII ( ), an acronym for American Standard Code for Information Interchange, is a character encoding standard for representing a particular set of 95 (English language focused) printable character, printable and 33 control character, control c ...
, needed by programmers among others, available on the first or second (shifted) levels without unduly increasing the size of the keyboard. * The placements of some special symbols are changed when compared to the English (UK and US) versions of QWERTY. Some of the special key inscriptions are often changed from an abbreviation to a graphical symbol (for example becomes a hollow arrow pointing up, becomes a left-pointing arrow). In German and Austrian keyboards, most of the other abbreviated labels are in German: (control) is
translated Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. The English language draws a terminological distinction (which does not exist in every language) between ''transla ...
to its German equivalent "Strg" for ', and is abbreviated "Entf" ('). and on the
numeric keypad A numeric keypad, number pad, numpad, or ten key, is the calculator-style group of ten numeric keys accompanied by other keys, usually on the far right side of computer keyboard. This grouping allows quick number entry with right hand, ...
are not translated, however. (See: Key labels)


Variants

The QWERTZ layout is widely used in German-speaking Europe as well as other
Central Europe Central Europe is a geographical region of Europe between Eastern Europe, Eastern, Southern Europe, Southern, Western Europe, Western and Northern Europe, Northern Europe. Central Europe is known for its cultural diversity; however, countries in ...
an and
Balkan The Balkans ( , ), corresponding partially with the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throug ...
countries that use the
Latin script The Latin script, also known as the Roman script, is a writing system based on the letters of the classical Latin alphabet, derived from a form of the Greek alphabet which was in use in the ancient Greek city of Cumae in Magna Graecia. The Gree ...
. While the core German-speaking countries use QWERTZ more or less exclusively, the situation among German-speakers in
East Belgium The German-speaking Community (, , DG), also known as East Belgium ( ), is one of the three federal communities of Belgium. The community is composed of nine municipalities in Liège Province, Wallonia, within the Eupen-Malmedy region in Easte ...
,
Luxembourg Luxembourg, officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, is a landlocked country in Western Europe. It is bordered by Belgium to the west and north, Germany to the east, and France on the south. Its capital and most populous city, Luxembour ...
, and
South Tyrol South Tyrol ( , ; ; ), officially the Autonomous Province of Bolzano – South Tyrol, is an autonomous administrative division, autonomous provinces of Italy, province in northern Italy. Together with Trentino, South Tyrol forms the autonomo ...
is more varied. The other countries using QWERTZ were historically parts of
Austria-Hungary Austria-Hungary, also referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Dual Monarchy or the Habsburg Monarchy, was a multi-national constitutional monarchy in Central Europe#Before World War I, Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. A military ...
and/or had strong German technological, economic and cultural influences, which caused them to use German typewriters with the QWERTZ layout.


Albanian

QWERTZ is the default keyboard layout for the
Albanian language Albanian (Endonym and exonym, endonym: , , or ) is an Indo-European languages, Indo-European language and the only surviving representative of the Albanoid, Albanoid branch, which belongs to the Paleo-Balkan languages, Paleo-Balkan group. It ...
in
Microsoft Windows Windows is a Product lining, product line of Proprietary software, proprietary graphical user interface, graphical operating systems developed and marketed by Microsoft. It is grouped into families and subfamilies that cater to particular sec ...
.


Austria and Germany

The PC keyboard layout commonly used in
Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...
and
Austria Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a landlocked country in Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine Federal states of Austria, states, of which the capital Vienna is the List of largest cities in Aust ...
is based on one defined in a former edition (October 1988) of the German standard
DIN DIN or Din or din may refer to: People and language * Din (name), people with the name * Dīn, an Arabic word with three general senses: judgment, custom, and religion from which the name originates * Dinka language (ISO 639 code: din), spoken ...
2137-2. The current edition DIN 2137:2012-06 standardizes it as the first (basic) one of three layouts, calling it “T1” (', or “keyboard layout 1”). It employs
dead key A dead key is a special kind of modifier key on a mechanical typewriter, or computer keyboard, that is typically used to attach a specific diacritic to a base letter (alphabet), letter. The dead key does not generate a (complete) grapheme, charact ...
s to type accented characters like , and the key to access characters in the third level (e.g. , , , the
euro sign The euro sign () is the currency sign used for the euro, the official currency of the eurozone. The design was presented to the public by the European Commission on 12 December 1996. It consists of a stylized letter E (or epsilon), crossed by ...
, or the micro- ). The “T2” layout as specified in the 2012 edition of the German standard also uses the
group selection Group selection is a proposed mechanism of evolution in which natural selection acts at the level of the group, instead of at the level of the individual or gene. Early authors such as V. C. Wynne-Edwards and Konrad Lorenz argued that the beha ...
to access special characters like the
long s The long s, , also known as the medial ''s'' or initial ''s'', is an Archaism, archaic form of the lowercase letter , found mostly in works from the late 8th to early 19th centuries. It replaced one or both of the letters ''s'' in a double-''s ...
, or foreign characters like “ Æ” or “ Ə”.


Sorbian

Sorbian QWERTZ is practically identical to the German layout, but the additional Sorbian characters can be entered with dead keys; it has three different layouts: Standard, Legacy, and Extended. All are supported by Microsoft Windows (Windows 7 and later only).


Czech

The QWERTZ keyboard layout is commonly used in the
Czech Republic The Czech Republic, also known as Czechia, and historically known as Bohemia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the south ...
, but the
QWERTY QWERTY ( ) is a keyboard layout for Latin-script alphabets. The name comes from the order of the first six Computer keyboard keys#Types, keys on the top letter row of the keyboard: . The QWERTY design is based on a layout included in the Sh ...
variant is an unofficial option. The characters from the American keyboard (@#$&\, []<>^`~*) and some other characters and diacritic, diacritic signs (÷פ€ßĐ𣳰˘˝·˛¸) that are missing on the Czech mechanical typewriter keyboard can be accessed with the AltGr key. The layout on the picture is supported by Microsoft Windows. The QWERTZ layout is more efficient for Czech, as the letter Z is slightly more common than the letter Y, but only 4% more efficient than QWERTY. An internet poll in 2013 stated that 56% of Czech users used QWERTZ and 44% used QWERTY, but in 2020 57% of Czech users used QWERTY and 43% used QWERTZ.


Hungary

On some keyboards, the "" key is located to the left of the Enter key, while on others it is placed to the left of the backspace key (see the two pictures on the right). An unusual feature of this Hungarian keyboard layout is the position of the 0 (zero): it is located to the left of the 1, so that most of the accented characters can be together on the right side of the keyboard. The official layout is of type QWERTZ, which is therefore the most widely used keyboard layout in the country.
QWERTY QWERTY ( ) is a keyboard layout for Latin-script alphabets. The name comes from the order of the first six Computer keyboard keys#Types, keys on the top letter row of the keyboard: . The QWERTY design is based on a layout included in the Sh ...
used to be widespread due to there not being a dedicated Hungarian layout commonly available for older computers, but since this is no longer an issue, virtually everyone uses QWERTZ in everyday computing. On "
ISO The International Organization for Standardization (ISO ; ; ) is an independent, non-governmental, international standard development organization composed of representatives from the national standards organizations of member countries. Me ...
" keyboards (as in the first picture) and "BAE" keyboards (as in the second), the key is positioned on the key to the right of the left key. To adapt to 101/104-key (ANSI) keyboards which do not have that key, the MS Windows QWERTY layout has put the Í on the usual key for the 0 (zero) while the 0 has been moved to that key's tertiary () layer; on Macintosh computers, both layouts (QWERTY and QWERTZ) have this adaptation.


Poland

A variant of the QWERTZ keyboard has been used in
Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...
, but
QWERTY QWERTY ( ) is a keyboard layout for Latin-script alphabets. The name comes from the order of the first six Computer keyboard keys#Types, keys on the top letter row of the keyboard: . The QWERTY design is based on a layout included in the Sh ...
keyboards have been dominant since the early 1990s.


Romanian

The standard keyboard layout as established by the standard SR 13392:2004 is QWERTY. However, a Romanian QWERTZ keyboard (corresponding to older standards) was set up on Windows 3.1 and renamed "Romanian (Legacy)" on all versions since Windows Vista, because of the introduction of the two standard QWERTY layouts with the correct diacritics. Since it was devised before the disunification of "Ș" ( S-comma) and "Ț" ( T-comma) with "Ş" (S-
cedilla A cedilla ( ; from Spanish language, Spanish ', "small ''ceda''", i.e. small "z"), or cedille (from French , ), is a hook or tail () added under certain letters (as a diacritic, diacritical mark) to indicate that their pronunciation is modif ...
; used in Turkic languages) and "Ţ" (T cedilla), the characters with cedilla were used in the layout (and these are still used in the default 1250 encoding). In 2012, a version with commas was made and it is available as a custom layout to be installed by the interested end-user.


Slovak

Typewriters in Slovakia have used the QWERTZ layout quite similar to the layout used on the Czech typewriters. Slovak QWERTZ layout differs from the Czech one in using the letter instead of the Czech on the same position, also the letter is on the position of Czech and the letter is on the position of Czech . There are 2 more keys that differ in these 2 languages: Slovak key replaces the Czech key and Slovak key replaces the Czech key. There are 17 characters from American keyboard (@#$&\, []<>^`~*') that are missing on the Slovak keyboard because of the presence of the Slovak letters (ľščňťžôúáíýéä°´ˇ§). Users can access them with the key, however, the position of these characters varies between different operating systems. Besides the QWERTZ keyboard layout inherited from the typewriter era, QWERTY layout is also used by computer users in Slovakia. The only difference is that the and keys are swapped.


South Slavic Latin

The
Serbo-Croatian Latin Gaj's Latin alphabet ( sh-Latn-Cyrl, Gajeva latinica, separator=" / ", Гајева латиница}, ), also known as ( sr-Cyrl, абецеда, ) or ( sr-Cyrl, гајица, link=no, ), is the form of the Latin script used for writing all ...
and Slovene keyboard layout has five additional special characters Č, Ć, Ž, Š and Đ. This keyboard layout was standardized in the 1980s in
Yugoslavia , common_name = Yugoslavia , life_span = 1918–19921941–1945: World War II in Yugoslavia#Axis invasion and dismemberment of Yugoslavia, Axis occupation , p1 = Kingdom of SerbiaSerbia , flag_p ...
. Characters Ć and Đ are only part of
Gaj's Latin alphabet Gaj's Latin alphabet ( sh-Latn-Cyrl, Gajeva latinica, separator=" / ", Гајева латиница}, ), also known as ( sr-Cyrl, абецеда, ) or ( sr-Cyrl, гајица, link=no, ), is the form of the Latin script used for writing all ...
but not part of the
Slovene alphabet The Slovene alphabet or Slovenian alphabet (, or ''slovenska gajica'' ) is an extension of the Latin script used to write Slovene. The standard language uses a Latin alphabet which is a slight modification of the Croatian Gaj's Latin alphabet ...
, nevertheless they remain in Slovenian keyboards (for economic reasons, for historical reasons and for writing words in the closely related South Slavic languages). The Ž is on the right side of the Ć key on keyboards which have a longer
backspace Backspace (, ⌫) is the keyboard key that in typewriters originally pushed the carriage one position backwards, and in modern computer systems typically moves the display cursor one position backwards,The meaning of "backwards" depends on the dir ...
key, and the usual inverted L-shaped Enter key. The layout makes heavy use of the
AltGr AltGr (also Alt Graph) is a modifier key found on computer keyboards. It is primarily used to type characters that are used less frequently in the language that the keyboard is designed for, such as foreign currency symbols, typographic marks ...
(right Alt) key for non-alphabetic characters and
dead key A dead key is a special kind of modifier key on a mechanical typewriter, or computer keyboard, that is typically used to attach a specific diacritic to a base letter (alphabet), letter. The dead key does not generate a (complete) grapheme, charact ...
combinations for adding diacritics to Latin characters. It is possible to type
Albanian Albanian may refer to: *Pertaining to Albania in Southeast Europe; in particular: **Albanians, an ethnic group native to the Balkans **Albanian language **Albanian culture **Demographics of Albania, includes other ethnic groups within the country ...
,
Czech Czech may refer to: * Anything from or related to the Czech Republic, a country in Europe ** Czech language ** Czechs, the people of the area ** Czech culture ** Czech cuisine * One of three mythical brothers, Lech, Czech, and Rus *Czech (surnam ...
,
German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...
, Hungarian,
Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, a Romance ethnic group related to or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance languag ...
,
Polish Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Polish people, people from Poland or of Polish descent * Polish chicken * Polish brothers (Mark Polish and Michael Polish, born 1970), American twin ...
,
Romanian Romanian may refer to: *anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Romania **Romanians, an ethnic group **Romanian language, a Romance language ***Romanian dialects, variants of the Romanian language **Romanian cuisine, traditional ...
, and Slovak using only the Serbo-Croatian keyboard layout. There is a proposed variant of new Slovene keyboard layout, which would remove Ć and Đ from top layout and add @ instead. The command keys would also become translated into Slovene and some minor second level layout changes would be made. For Serbian, there is also a Cyrillic keyboard variant, in which and are replaced with Љ (Lj) and Њ (Nj) respectively. However, the Apple keyboards for Croatian are QWERTY.


Swiss (German, French, Italian, Romansh), Liechtenstein, Luxembourg

The layout of the Swiss keyboard is established by the national standard SN 074021:1999. It is designed to allow easy access to frequently used accents of the French, German and Italian languages and major currency signs. It was designed from the beginning for usage with multiple languages (not only those spoken in Switzerland) in mind. The difference between the Swiss German () and the Swiss French () layout is that the German variety has the German umlauts (ä, ö, ü) accessible in the unshifted state, while the French version has some French accented characters (é, à, è) accessible in the unshifted state. The actual keyboards have the keys engraved for both variations; the difference is only in the driver (software) settings. In the latest versions of Windows there are also separately listed driver settings for Swiss Italian and Swiss Romansh, but they correspond to the Swiss French and Swiss German layout, respectively. In Mac OS X 10.6 and Linux, only Swiss French and Swiss German are available, and on iPadOS, the only layout for Switzerland is Swiss German. As Swiss German does not make use of the esszett (ß)
ligature Ligature may refer to: Language * Ligature (writing), a combination of two or more letters into a single symbol (typography and calligraphy) * Ligature (grammar), a morpheme that links two words Medicine * Ligature (medicine), a piece of suture us ...
, on Windows its keyboard lacks the symbol in contrast to the German and Austrian QWERTZ layouts. Linux and macOS typically assign ß to and respectively. While the German keyboard uses German labels for its keys (e.g. instead of ), Swiss keyboards use the English abbreviations as a "neutral" solution to avoid favouring or excluding any of the national
languages of Switzerland The four national languages of Switzerland are German language, German, French language, French, Italian language, Italian, and Romansh language, Romansh. German, French, and Italian maintain equal status as official languages at the national ...
. Unlike the Windows keyboard layouts used in France and Belgium, the Swiss layout does not have a key dedicated to the accented letter “ù”. The MacOS layout typically assigns this letter to .
Luxembourg Luxembourg, officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, is a landlocked country in Western Europe. It is bordered by Belgium to the west and north, Germany to the east, and France on the south. Its capital and most populous city, Luxembour ...
does not have a keyboard layout of its own. Public education and administration use the Swiss-French keyboard which also represents the Microsoft Windows standard keyboard layout for Luxembourg, while some in the private sector prefer the Belgian AZERTY or American QWERTY layouts.
Liechtenstein Liechtenstein (, ; ; ), officially the Principality of Liechtenstein ( ), is a Landlocked country#Doubly landlocked, doubly landlocked Swiss Standard German, German-speaking microstate in the Central European Alps, between Austria in the east ...
also use the Swiss German layout without an ß character.


See also

*
AZERTY AZERTY ( ) is a specific layout for the characters of the Latin alphabet on typewriter keys and computer keyboards. The layout takes its name from the first six letters to appear on the first row of alphabetical keys; that is, ( ). Like oth ...
*
QWERTY QWERTY ( ) is a keyboard layout for Latin-script alphabets. The name comes from the order of the first six Computer keyboard keys#Types, keys on the top letter row of the keyboard: . The QWERTY design is based on a layout included in the Sh ...
*
QZERTY 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. Standard keybo ...
* German keyboard layout *
Blickensderfer typewriter The Blickensderfer typewriter was invented by George Canfield Blickensderfer (1850–1917) and patented on April 12, 1892. Blickensderfer was a nephew of John Celivergos Zachos, the inventor of the stenotype. Two models, Model 1 and Model 5 ...
*
Dvorak keyboard layout Dvorak () is a keyboard layout for English patented in 1936 by August Dvorak and his brother-in-law, William Dealey, as a faster and more ergonomic alternative to the QWERTY layout (the ''de facto'' standard keyboard layout). Dvorak proponen ...
* Neo, an optimized German keyboard layout *
Enigma machine The Enigma machine is a cipher device developed and used in the early- to mid-20th century to protect commercial, diplomatic, and military communication. It was employed extensively by Nazi Germany during World War II, in all branches of the W ...


References

{{Keyboard layouts Computer keyboard types Latin-script keyboard layouts