Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin

> I use an electric typewriter. Nothing beats it for creative writing

There's another use case for typewriters that computer still aren't very good at: filling out forms. I haven't bought one yet but I can definitely see why some companies still use them to fill out pre-printed forms.



I grew up with word processors, but I still kept an electric typewriter handy for filling out paper forms. It was a pain to align the print head with fields on paper, and erasing was a chore if I had to go back than the machine's 5 word buffer would allow. But it still looked better than my handwriting would have.

I kinda miss having it around. But on the plus side, my handwriting's a lot better these days -- and most forms come in PDF format now, anyway.


Form Field PDF's, when made available, are pretty slick.

http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f1040ez.pdf


And the problem’s not only technical—it’s only been recently that companies have started accepting digitally filled & signed forms.




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: