some keyboards or calculators add an extra key to take more advantage of button space. for example, the shift key on a keyboard provides an alternate version of basically every key associated with a character, and the TI-84 Plus CE has two of these buttons: a 2nd key and an alpha key. something important to note about these keys is that while the 2nd key changes the function of the alpha key, the alpha key does not change the function of the 2nd key. this is because if it did, there would be no way to exit alpha or 2nd mode, because neither of those keys could do that anymore. this means that the maximum number of actions you can do with a keyboard with N keys is… something kind of difficult to figure out, difficult enough that you could make a post about it!
if it wasn't 2:34 am rn i would photoshop a keyboard with only shift keys on it :D
relevant tom7:
