TI-99/4 has a dedicated space key?

[jrhodes]

I guess i just never noticed this until now, but the TI-99/4 has a normal spacebar, as well as a key marked "SPACE". Why?

Do both the "SPACE" key and spacebar send the same key code, or different key codes? I.E. could you redefine the "SPACE" key character and leave the normal spacebar space (char 32) alone for normal text use?

Anyone have some insight on this "SPACE" key?

[Toucan]

1 hour ago, jrhodes said:

I guess i just never noticed this until now, but the TI-99/4 has a normal spacebar, as well as a key marked "SPACE". Why?

Do both the "SPACE" key and spacebar send the same key code, or different key codes? I.E. could you redefine the "SPACE" key character and leave the normal spacebar space (char 32) alone for normal text use?

Anyone have some insight on this "SPACE" key?

I think I remember hearing that since there was no semicolon key on the 99/4, it lacked a key to rest your pinky finger on, which is why they made that overlay with the dummy key. However, maybe the original intention was that people could rest all their fingers on the keys and the space key would in turn provide some functionality for touch typists after adjusting to being one finger over?

[Casey]

It is just a space key. Exactly the same as pressing the space bar. Terminal Emulator II used this key as a CTRL key, but you could use the space bar the same way (as a CTRL key). The overlay for TE II I think has the dummy key to the right for the reason Toucan just described.

[Retrospect]

I guess they thought the keyboard would look a little odd without a key there (breaking up the staggered arrangement) and didn't really have a clue what to call the key so assigned it as an extra space key.  A dedicated back-space key NEVER crossed their minds, not even once.  

[+InsaneMultitasker]

Seeing the picture of the /4 keyboard reminds me to be quite thankful for the /4a layout!

[pixelpedant]

The way I figure, they just designed around a 4x10 matrix, and added in the supplemental spacebar at the bottom, as a quality-of-life feature. 

 

That would have been a very early addition, though.  The Dimension 1 and Dimension 4 prototypes (and even the concept art preceding them) have the space bar, in all the examples I've seen.  So that's all in the early design stage. 

 

As to the Space key in the third row, one reason for there to be a space key in the main 4x10 matrix is that a design idea which seemingly figured into the Dimension N units was the wireless joysticks reduplicating that matrix across two 20 key keypads:

 

 

You can see that notion of the "remotes" as secondary wireless keyboard represented even better here:

 

All of that becomes moot of course, as in the end, IR is dropped, and the wired remotes are just joysticks. But for the original design to work, it's necessary that there be a space key in the 4x10 matrix. 

 

[+FarmerPotato]

@pixelpedant said it all so well. Also @Casey I didn't know that about TE2. 
 

I learned from the TI-99/4 for about a year before the 4A. Including typing one-handed. 
 

But my grandmother's typewriter had a Space key up in that quarter, too. (It also had many interesting keys over on the right. Fractions, the c for cents, maths, pound sterling...)

 

I had difficulty with the 4A Fctn key being in the lower right, where the 99/4  had Shift-S  so close together.  

 

The Dimension plans really shed a lot of light on the left/right keyboard division and Joystick -4.