Unit 1- Input Devices

INPUT DEVICES
Input devices can be defined as an electromechanical device that allows the user to feed data into the
computer for analysis and storage and to give commands to the computer.

Types of input devices:-

The computer accepts input in two ways—manually and directly. In the case of manual data entry, the user
enters the data into the computer by hand, by using the keyboard and the mouse. Direct data entry is
accomplished by using special devices like a barcode reader. Some of the commonly used input devices are
keyboard, pointing devices like mouse and joystick, speech recognition system, digital camera, scanners and
so on. The computer accepts input in two ways – manually and directly.

1. keyboard: A keyboard is the most common data entry devices through which the user can type text
and commands. There are different types of keyboard layouts such as QWERTY, DVORAK and
AZERTY, but the most common layout is the QWERTY. The number of keys on a typical keyboard
varies from 84 to 109. Laptops have slightly different key arrangements than a standard keyboard.

Layout of the keyboard:- keys in QWERTY layout are categorized under following groups.

 alphanumeric keys: It include the letter keys(1,2,a,b&so on)

 Numeric keys: It includes digits and mathematical operators and are located on right- hand side
of the keyboard.
 Function keys: the function keys(eg:- F1, F2……) are arranged on the top of the keyboard
 Cursor-movement keys- it includes four directional arrow keys which are arranged between
alphanumeric keys and numeric keypad.
 Other keys: It includes Enter keys, Shift, Caps lock, Num lock, Spacebar, Tab, Print Screen,
Home, End, Insert, Delete, Page Up, and so on.

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2. Pointing Devices:
A pointing device is used to communicate with the computer by pointing to the locations on the
monitor. Such devices do not require keying of characters, instead the user can move a cursor on the
screen and perform move, click or drag operations. Some of the commonly used pointing devices are
mouse, trackball, joystick, light pen, touch screen and track pad.

Following are the commonly used pointing devices:-

<1> Mouse:- A mouse is a small rectangular shaped hand-held pointing device, with a rubber ball
embedded at its lower side and buttons on the top.

There are 2 types of mouse: The mouse may be classified as a mechanical mouse or an optical mouse

(i) Mechanical mouse uses a rubber ball at the bottom surface, which rotates as the mouse is
moved along a flat surface to move the cursor.
It is the most common and least expensive pointing device.
(ii) Optical mouse : uses a light beam instead of a rotating ball to detect the movement across a
specially patterned mouse pad. As the user rolls the mouse on a flat surface, the cursor on the
screen small sensor that measures the speed of the axle. Following figure shows a typical
mouse.

Mouse actions:

(i) Pointing – Moving the mouse pointer to position it on an object like icon or menu item.
(ii) Click – Action of pressing down a mouse button(usually left) and releasing it.
(iii) Right Click – Here right mouse button is clicked which often produces a ‘pop-up’ menu
and offers options to be selected for any object.
(iv) Double Click – It refers to action of clicking the mouse button twice in rapid succession
without moving the mouse between the clicks.
(v) Drag and Drop – Refers to the action of clicking and holding down the mouse button
while moving the mouse(drag) and releasing the mouse button(drop).
<2> Track Ball:-

 A trackball is another pointing device that resembles a ball nestled in a square cradle and serves as an
alternative to a mouse. In general, the trackball is like a mouse turned upside down. It has a ball,
which can be rotated by fingers in any direction, and the cursor moves accordingly. The size of the
ball in the trackball varies from as large as a cue ball to as small as a marble. It is static because
instead moving the mouse on the table we are just rolling the ball by using thumbs and palm.(The

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three shapes, which are commonly used are ball, button and square). Track ball requires less space
than mouse in operation.
<3>Joystick:-

A joystick is a device that moves in all directions and controls the movement
of the cursor. The basic design of a joystick consists of a stick that is attached
to a plastic base with a flexible rubber sheath. The plastic base houses a
circuit board beneath the stick. The electronic circuitry measures the
movement of the stick from its central position and sends the information for
processing. The joystick offers three type of control :Digital Control, Glide
control , Direct control

a.) Digital Control : allows movement in a limited number of directions up, down left, right.

b.) Glide control c.) Direct control : allow movements in all directions (3600). But direct control joysticks
have the added ability to respond to the distance and speed with which the user moves the stick. Following
figure shows a typical joystick. (joysticks are mainly used for games).

<4>Light Pen: A light pen (sometimes called a mouse pen) is a hand-held electro-optical pointing device,
which when touched or aimed closely at a connected computer monitor will allow the computer to determine
the position of the pen on the screen. It facilitates drawing images and selects objects on the display screen
by directly pointing to the objects. It is a pen-like device, which is connected to the machine by a cable.
Although named light pen, it actually does not emit light, but its light-sensitive diode would sense the light
coming from the screen.

• Using the light pens, users can interact more easily with applications, such modes as drag and drop, or
highlighting.
• Pushing the light pen tip against the screen activates a switch, which makes user to make menu
selections.

<5>Touch Screen: A touch screen is special kind of display

screen device which is placed on the computer monitor to allow
direct selection or activation of the computer when the user
touches the screen. Essentially, it registers the input when a finger
or other object touches the screen. The touch screen is normally
used when information has to be accessed with minimum effort. However, the touch screen is not suitable

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for input of large amounts of data. Typically, they are used in information providing systems like the
hospitals, airlines and railway reservation counters amusement parks and so on. Following figure shows a
typical touch screen.

<6>Trackpad (Touch pad): : A track pad (also referred to as touchpad) is a

stationary pointing device that works by sensing the movement of fingers across a
small sensitive surface (1.5 or 2 inch.) and translating them into the pointer
movement on the screen. It is generally used in laptops, but can also be connected
to the PC through a cord. It is also equipped in personal digital assistants (PDAs) and media players such as
iPod. Typically, a track pad also consists of two or three buttons, which work as mouse buttons. Many track
pads are also strike sensitive, that is, the user can tap on track pad to perform operations like selecting an
object, maximizing/minimizing the window and so on. Following figure shows a typical touch pad.

3. Speech Recognition System:- It is the technology by which sounds, words or

phrases spoken by the individuals are converted into digital signal and these
signals are transformed into computer generated text or commands.

• The speech recognition system “learns” the voice of the user.

Figure : speech recognition system

3. Digital Camera: It stores images digitally picture once taken will be transferred to a computer
system and then manipulated with an image editing software and printed. The big advantage of
digital cameras is that making photos is both inexpensive and fast.

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5.Webcam:

A webcam is a portable video camera which captures live video or images that may be viewed in real time
over the network or the internet. It is a small digital camera that is either inbuilt into computer or connected
through a USB port. It is normally placed on top of the PC monitor or laptop.

Web cams are classified into two types streaming and snapshot. In streaming web cam moving images are
captured. In snapshot still images are captured.

The streaming webcam captures the moving images(30 IMAGES PER SECOND) whereas snapshot
webcam captures only still images and refreshes it continuously.

6. Scanners: A scanner is an input device that converts a document into an electronic format that can be
stored on disk. The electronic image can be edited manipulated combined and printed by using editing
software. The scanners are also called as optical scanners as they use a light beam to scan the input data.

There are two types of scanners

1. Hand Held Scanner

2. Flat bed Scanner

Types of scanners:-

<1> Hand – held Scanners: It consists of light emitting diodes which are placed over the document to be
scanned. It performs the scanning slowly from the top to the bottom with its light on. In this process all the
documents are converted and stored as an image. This device read the data on the price tags, shipping labels,
etc. The size of hand held scanner is small. They are available in various resolution upto about 800 dots per
inch(dpi) and in either grey scale or colour mode.

<2>Flat- Bed Scanner: It is similar to photocopier machine. It consists of a box containing a glass plate on
its top used for placing the document and a lid that covers a glass plate.

The light beam is placed below the glass plate and when it is activated it moves horizontally from left
to right line by line. These scanners can scan black and white as well as color images. These are larger in
size and are expensive. They produce better qualityimage.

7. Optical Character Recognition(OCR): OCR

software is needed to scan the document containing text

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input. When the scanner scans the document, scanned document is stored as a bitmap in the memory. OCR
software translates the bitmap image of the text to the ASCII codes that the computer can interpret as letters,
numbers and special characters.

During OCR processing, text is analyzed for light and dark areas to identify each letter or digit. When a
character is recognized, it is converted into an ASCII code.
Two methods are used for OCR:

<1> Matrix Matching: It compares what OCR scanner sees as a character with a library of character
matrices or templates. When any image matches, computer labels it as corresponding ASCII character.

<2>Feature Extraction: It does not require strict matching to templates. Here computer looks for general
features such as open areas, closed shapes, lines.

After the completion of OCR processing, the final information can be stored in formats like text or
RTF (RICH TEXT FORMAT).

8.Optical Mark Recognition(OMR): It is the process

of detecting the presence of intended marked responses.
A mark registers less light than the surrounding paper.
The optical mark reading is done by a special device
known as optical mark reader. A mark has to be
positioned correctly on the paper and should be darker
than the surrounding paper so that it can be detected by
the OMR reader.

OMR is performed using a reflective light method where a beam of light is reflected on a sheet with
marks to capture the reflection or the absence of reflection. OMR data entry system converts the information
about the presence or absence of marks into a computer data file. A simple pen or pencil mark is made on
the form to indicate each selected response such as answer to survey questions. The completed forms are
scanned by an optical mark reader which detects the presence of a mark by measuring the reflected light.
OMR reader interprets marks into a data record and sends this to the computer for storage, analysis and
reporting.

9.Magnetic Ink Character Recognition(MICR):

In the bottom of a bank cheque characters are
printed using a special ink which contains iron

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particles that can be magnetized. To recognize these, MICR is used. It reads the characters by examining
their shapes in a matrix form and the information is then passed onto the computer.

MICR gives extra security against forgeries in comparison to OCR. The reading speed of the MICR is
higher. MICR is very efficient and time saving for data processing.

10.Barcode Reader : A barcode is a machine- readable code in the

form of parallel vertical lines of varying widths. It is commonly used
for labeling goods and numbering books in libraries. This code is
sensed and read by a barcode reader using reflective light and is
converted into electrical signal which is then converted into
alphanumeric data. The pen in the bar code unit reads the information
stored in the bar code and converts it into a series of ASCII characters
by which the operating system gets the information stored in the bar code.

Capturing data is faster and accurate with bar code reader. It also reduces labor cost and data collection
errors. It is normally used in supermarkets, department stores, etc.

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