AZERTY Keyboard

What Does AZERTY Keyboard Mean?

The AZERTY keyboard layout is another version of the English QWERTY keyboard. This type of layout is mainly used in France and in other parts of Europe, although some countries have their own version of the AZERTY. Its name was derived from the first six consecutive letters on the top-left row of the keyboard. Aside from the placement of letters, AZERTY differs from QWERTY in several other ways.

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Techopedia Explains AZERTY Keyboard

The AZERTY keyboard first appeared within the last decades of the 19th century in France as an alternative layout to the American QWERTY version of typewriters. By 1976, a QWERTY version adapted to the French language was proposed as an experiment by the French National Organization for Standardization. This proposal paved the way for a temporary variation period until the current AZERTY layout was established. One prominent feature of the keyboard is its emphasis on accents, which are quite important for writing European languages like French.

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Margaret Rouse

Margaret Rouse is an award-winning technical writer and teacher known for her ability to explain complex technical subjects to a non-technical, business audience. Over the past twenty years her explanations have appeared on TechTarget websites and she's been cited as an authority in articles by the New York Times, Time Magazine, USA Today, ZDNet, PC Magazine and Discovery Magazine.Margaret's idea of a fun day is helping IT and business professionals learn to speak each other’s highly specialized languages. If you have a suggestion for a new definition or how to improve a technical explanation, please email Margaret or contact her…