Portable Electronic Keyboard for Computer Input by Telephone

This device, which may be acoustically-coupled to any conventional telephone handset, generates coded tone sequences representing alphanumeric characters. The full ASCII character set, coded with parity, is used, and all 128 symbols available for selection are displayed on the device in a small electronic ``keyboard.´´ The transmitted tone sequences correspond to those generated by most Teletype-Dataphone terminals in typical time-sharing systems. In operation, the user dials the remote machine and then inputs messages, character-by-character, by pointing at the selected symbols on the keyboard with a hand-held selection ``pen,´´ in a hunt- and-peck fashion. It is assumed that this device would be used to communicate with a machine which has voice answer-back capabilities.