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Comment by frereubu | Hacker News Reader

This isn't about security or being weatherproof. This is about basics, like using a QWERTY keyboard that everyone's familiar with, and clear instructions that are easy to follow. I work in tech and each time I see one of these I'm glad I can pay by smartphone.

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I worked for a while as a contractor for Parkeon/Flowbird, and asked about the keyboard layout to a hardware manager there.

His explanation was that they did not use AZERTY or QWERTY because it wouldn't work for foreigners.

QWERTY isn't the official worldwide standard. These machines are also used in France, where AZERTY is the (imho terrible) norm.

However the 3-row layout is mostly the same everywhere so it would just be a matter of swapping plastic overlays & keymaps in software.

This machine is in the UK.

Obviously, where else would you find such pettiness?

Relying upon a machine that is so complex and frustrating to use far outweighs the tiny loss of revenue for when people pass on unused parking time to someone else.

ok but no layout puts the "0" as the first digit

TIL that no layouts put 0 as first digit. Not US, UK, FR, German or so.

Somehow I thought the opposite, I was sure that my layout (Hungarian[1]) is about the same as every other, most probably a direct copy of the German, but nah.

[1]: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=hungarian+keyboard+layout&iar=imag...

Earlier typewriters didn’t have 0 and 1 keys [1] and instead the O and l keys did double duty. When 0 and 1 keys were finally added on typewriters, there probably wasn’t enough space to add them both on the left side. The fact that the previously used O key is to the right may also have been a factor.

[1] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/88/Olivetti...

is it not possible to re-configure the machine to match the market it's going to?

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