The inventor of F Keyboard, International Information Technologies and Communication Federation (INTERSTENO) Turkish Agency Honorary President Dr. İhsan Sıtkı Yener passed away at the age of 91.

INTERSTENO Turkish Group Management announced in a written statement that the inventor of F keyboard Yener passed away at the age of 91.

Yener's funeral will take place on Sunday afternoon in Şişli Mosque and after the prayer, Yener will be buried in Ayazağa Cemetary. The statement is as follows:

“Our teacher İhsan Yener, devoted his life to F keyboard, and raised thousands of students, hundreds of teachers and tens of world champions. He invented F keyboard in 1955, the keyboard most suitable to Turkish language and alphabet, developed a scientific method to ten-finger type without looking and presented it to Turkey. Thanks to Mr. Yener's efforts, on May 5^th 1957 Turkey joined INTERSTENO operating under United Nations that is the largest professional organisation in the world in field of typing technologies and he acted as Turkish Representative/ member of Central Committee for many years. İhsan Yener later became Honorary President of this organisation. 

Prized professor İhsan Yener devoted his 91 years of life to F keyboard and scientific method of ten-finger typing with without looking. His demise deeply saddened us as students he raised, and we offer our condolences to the entire community, his grieving family and Turkish nation. May God rest his soul in peace.”

Turkey won more than 80 medals thanks to him

INTERSTENO Turkey Representative and Yener's assistant Seçkin Köse marked that thanks to Dr. Yener's efforts, Turkey has received more than 80 medals in international keyboard competitions and he spoke as follows: “Professor İhsan worked all his life on F keyboard. Thanks to him, Turkey has received more than 80 gold medals in computer keyboard competitions biannually organised abroad and World Computer Keyboard Championship organised online annually. He invented and developed F keyboard, made it national and enabled Turkey to achieve worldwide success in this field. He cannot be replaced but we will continue to contribute in development of F keyboard.”

The most scientific keyboard

F keyboard developed specifically for Turkish was approved by Inter-ministerial Standardisation Committee on October 20^th 1955 and has been used since then.

The first figure that started working on an optimal keyboard for Turkish was typing teacher İhsan Sıtkı Yener who collaborated with Ministry of National Education. Anthony R. Lanza and Edward Tutark Jr. who arrived in Turkey as part of the cooperation agreement signed between Ankara University and University of New York, participated in this research. The team from University of New York summarized the studies in a report for International Cooperation Management that financed the studies. Following the Second World War, USA proposed Marshall Plan to provide economic support to sixteen countries, and the aim of institutions that organised the donations was to support projects which would lead to Turkey's financial advancement within this context. According to the report, Turkey could save 43.500 Turkish Lira yearly if a keyboard suitable for typing in Turkish was developed and used as a standard. The first of the two commissions formed to produce this keyboard worked on frequency and sequence of letters in Turkish and the second worked on keyboard arrangement studying physical qualities of fingers.

No Q Keyboards in Public Service in 2017

The keyboard designed at the end of studies was initially presented to State Supply Office. This keyboard was approved by Inter-ministerial Standardisation Committee on October 20^th 1955. Replacing all typewriters with National Keyboard became certain after it was added to Customs Law in 1963 and approved as “mandatory standard” by Turkish Standards Institute in 1974. Despite years of efforts, it did not become widespread against Q keyboard. In a notice published in Official Gazette by Prime Ministry on December 10^th 2013, an instruction was issued to make F keyboard widespread in public organisation and institutions, the most suitable keyboard for Turkish. It was announced that all keyboards in public organisation and institutions will be replaced with F keyboards until the end of year 2017.

In international fast keyboard typing competitions held since 1957, also participated by Turkey, 25 records have been broken and 59 world championships have been won on F keyboard.

Comparison with Q Keyboard

F keyboard is a keyboard developed specifically for Turkish, and typing a Turkish text on this keyboard takes significantly less time than on Q keyboard. Frequently used letters in Turkish are positioned more suitably for fingers. It is higher than standard Q keyboard for sequential letters' typing speeds are different and they are distributed in a way that better suits fingers. The main reason why typing is slower on Q keyboard is not it having a design exclusive to English; because it was designed for buttons to not to get jammed during fast typing. In addition, simulations made to establish the lost time as fingers pass from one letter to another on keyboard showed that typing on F keyboard is 11 percent faster than typing on Q keyboard in average. The same study also demonstrated that if positions of several letters are slightly altered in line with modern Turkish, typing will become 46 percent faster compared to typing on Q keyboard.

Although these are not official letters in Turkish alphabet, letters W, Q and X are also found on F keyboard. However the letters not in English but in Turkish alphabet as Ü, Ğ, İ, Ş, Ç and Ö are randomly added to the right of the Q keyboard that is not even suitable for English which makes it far from being suitable for Turkish.

As Q keyboard is regarded as the most universal keyboard for being widespread, F keyboard was accepted as the “most scientific keyboard” by the United Nations.

"I am accustomed to Q keyboard”

F keyboard that is the most suitable for Turkish, was produced after long-winded efforts with the aim of making typing on typewriters both easy and errorless. The frequently used letters in Turkish are positioned on easily accessible points, and F keyboard designed by considering the frequency of letters, sound relations between vowels and consonents, syllable and word structures, the strength, skill and activity of fingers in Turkish, suits Turkish more than the “Q keyboard” adapted to Turkish.

In a research held on nearly 30 thousand Turkish words, it was seen that the letter “a” was used  26 thousand 323, the letter "e" 16 thousand 308, the letter "k" 13 thousand 542 times, the letter "i" 13 thousand 384, the letter "m" 11 thousand 263, the letter "l" 10 thousand 496, the letter "t" 9669, and the letter "r" 8698 times. This rate was taken into consideration in design of F keyboard and the letters in question were placed in the most suitable points. On Q keyboard, the most frequently used letters in Turkish are positioned on furthest corners of the keyboard. On the other hand, the least used letter “j” with only 125 times in 30 thousand Turkish words, is positioned at the most accessible point on Q keyboard. On F keyboard this letter is replaced by the most used consonant in Turkish, the letter “k”.

Although little and ring fingers are the least functional fingers of the hand, a most frequently used letter in Turkish “a” corresponds to left little finger on Q keyboard. Again on Q keyboard, the least used letter in Turkish “j” corresponds to the most active finger of hand, right index finger. 

Because the numbers of consonents and vowels in Turkish are generally equal within the words, these are equally distributed to both hands on F keyboard. This arrangement of letters allows people to type for hours without getting tired. It does not make sense to use British Q keyboard which is more difficult and slow when we can use 45 percent of the letters that correspond to most active six fingers of both hands. Those who say “I am accustomed to Q keyboard, F keyboard is difficult for me” should know that they will get accustomed to F keyboard in a much shorter period of time than Q.