Input devices I.T

Joystick

A Pointing device used to move cursor position on a monitor screen. It is a stick having a spherical ball at its both lower and upper ends. The lower ball moves in a socket. The joystick can be moved in all four directions. It is mainly used in computer aided design and playing games

Light pen

A pointing device similar to a pen used to select a displayed menu item or to drawn pictures on the monitor screen

Barcode reader

An input device for reading bar coded data (data in the form of dark and light). It is generally used for labeling goods, numbering books etc. it may be handheld or embedded in a stationary scanner. The barcode reader scans a barcode image, converts into an alpha numeric value which is then fed to the computer to which the barcode reader is connected.

Microphone

An input device used to input sound that is stored in digital form. It is used for various applications like adding sound to a multi-media presentation of for mixing music.

Digitizer/graphic tablets

An input device which converts analogue information into digital form. Can be used by computer to create a picture of whatever the camera had been punting at. They are called graphic tablets because they convert graphics and pictorial data into Into binary inputs. A graphic tablet as a digitizer is used for doing fine works of drawing, image, manipulation, applications

CPU

Central processing unit

Advantages of the mouse

It's easy to use Moves faster than a keyboard Not very expensive Moves cursor faster than arrow keys on the keyboard

List some input devices

Keyboard, mouse, joystick, light pen, scanner, microphone, magnetic ink card reader, optical character reader, barcode reader, optical mark reader

Special purpose keys

Keys like enter, shift, caps lock, space bar, tab and print

What are the most common input devices

Mouse and keyboard

What are input devices

Peripheral, which are used to send or enter data into the computer system.

Control keys

Provide cursor and screen control, includes four directional arrows. Also the home, end, insert, delete, page up, page down, control (ctrl), escape (esc) and alternate (alt) keys

Kinds of keys

The numeric keyboard Function keys Control keys Special purpose keys

Function keys

These are the 12 keys in a row at the top the keyboard. Each key has a unique meaning and is used for a specific purpose.

Keyboard

This is the most common input device. It helps inputting data into the computer. The keys include the letter keys A-Z and digit keys 0-9

Mouse

This is the most popular pointing device.it is a cursor control device having a small palm sized with a round ball at it's base which senses the movement of the mouse and sends corresponding movements to the CPU when the buttons are clicked. It also has two keys

Magnetic ink character recognition

Used in banking to read data on cheques. Things Such as cheque number, bank branch code and account number are printed at the bottom in magnetic ink. The ink is magnetized by the MICR reader.

Track ball

Used mostly in notebook or laptop computers instead of a mouse. It is a ball which is half inserted and by moving fingers on the ball the pointer can be moved. Since the whole device is not moved it requires less space than a mouse

The numeric keypad

Used to enter numeric data. Usually consists of 17 keys and is generally laid out like most calculators

Scanner

Works like a photo copy machine. Used when some information is available on paper and is to be transferred to the hard disk of the computer for further use. Scanners capture images from the source which are then converted into digital form that can be stored on the disk. These images may be edited before printing.