Fn Key - Fn and Control Key Placement

Fn and Control Key Placement

There is not yet an agreed standard for the placement of the Fn key. It is usually placed adjacent to the left Control key, shrinking and displacing it in the process. The control key is most frequently associated with handy modifier keystrokes such as cut-and-paste, or application shortcuts such as control-s to save. The wide control key on a full size IBM PC keyboard layout allows users to become accustomed to using either the left or right side of the key for these shortcuts. In turn, shrinking and displacing it either to the left or the right causes considerable user-annoyance for a set of users. It is interesting to note that it is difficult to find user complaints regarding Mac laptops that also place the Fn key on the bottom left corner, displacing the control key to the right. This shows that users who disagree with the Fn key placement on ThinkPads may be users that switch from other brand machines that do not utilize the Mac OS.

Further aggravating the situation is the fact that the Fn key is a hardware meta-key which is not remappable through operating system level keyboard remapping tools, However Lenovo ThinkPad systems do allow remapping in the BIOS. One solution, which side-steps the fn and control placement issue, is remapping Caps-Lock as Control. This places Control in an easier to access location to the left of A-key and above the left-shift-key, a location that is favored by programmers and was used on Unix workstations.

• Most manufacturers today have shrunk and displaced the control key to the lower-left corner of the keyboard, placing Fn to its right. This includes most laptops from HP, Dell, Samsung, and Lenovo Ideapads.

• Lenovo Thinkpads place the Fn key in the lower left, displacing control to the right. However, unlike most other manufacturers, the control key remains an oversize key. Keyboards have been a strong source of loyalty for the brand due to both feel and layout, especially among highly technical users, and Thinkpad keyboards are highly regarded as some of the best laptop keyboards. However, their Fn key placement is sometimes a sticking point for users of other brands.

• Apple Laptops place Fn in the lower-left and shrink control to the right. However, Apple's OS X is somewhat less sensitive to control key shrinking, as it uses the Command-key for many common modifiers, making text-copy the PC keyboard equivalent of Alt-C instead of Ctrl-C.