Comment by jasim

On Keyboard Centricity: POS system in DOS.

      1. C:\> a                                    {enter}
      (a.bat starts c:\pos\pos.exe)
      
      2. Pull-down menu: Transactions -> Sales     {enter}
      (Sales is the default selection)

      3. Bill no: <last + 1>                       {enter}
      (new id starts a new bill)

      4. Item code: <4823>                         {4-digits+enter}
      5. Quantity: <2>                             {2-digits+enter}

      6. Item code: <blank>                        {enter}
      (just one item; give blank to exit)

      7. Menu: [Print, Next Bill]                  {enter}
      (Print is default selection)

      (loops back to 4, keying in a new bill)
    

Without a barcode scanner, a keyboard-centric interface takes the minimum possible number of keystrokes for a POS system. This efficiency was the norm in DOS-based text-centric systems, but with today's GUI interfaces, developers have to put extra effort to make things keyboard friendly. This is not done well enough in many cases, and is an instance of how the forced-advancement of technology makes things worse.