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Components & Memory

Space-Cadet Keyboard

A keyboard with extra modifier keys, designed at MIT for Lisp machines, whose key names still appear in the Emacs editor.

The Space-cadet keyboard was designed at the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory in the late 1970s for the Lisp Machine. Its extra modifier keys, including Meta, Super and Hyper, let a programmer press chords that produced a very large set of commands and symbols.

Its key names left traces in software. The Emacs text editor, written at MIT, still has Meta, Super and Hyper modifiers. Symbolics and Lisp Machines Inc. sold keyboards derived from the design.

Why it matters

The keyboard shows how hardware shaped software conventions. Emacs key names that look odd on a modern keyboard make sense once you see the machine they were written for.

Key facts

  • Designed at the MIT AI Laboratory.
  • Had Meta, Super and Hyper modifier keys.
  • Used with Lisp machines.
  • Influenced the Emacs key notation.

Sources

  1. Weinreb, Daniel, and David Moon. Lisp Machine Manual. MIT AI Laboratory, 1981.
  2. Stallman, Richard M. "EMACS: The Extensible, Customizable Self-Documenting Display Editor." MIT AI Memo 519a, 1981.
  3. Computer History Museum online collection catalog (computerhistory.org/collections).