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Project maintained by Cory Smith

INKEY$

Reads a character from the keyboard.

Syntax

v$=INKEY$

Comments

INKEY$ returns a null string if no character is present, a 1-byte string for standard keys and a 2-byte string for extended keys.

For extended keys, the first character is a null character (ASCII 0) and the second is the keyboard scan code.

INKEY$ does not echo the character to the screen.

If several characters are pending, only the first is returned.

Two character strings are used to return the extended codes described in Appendix C of the BASIC User’s Guide.

All characters except the following are passed to the program:

CTRL-BREAK CTRL-NUM LOCK CTRL-ALT-DEL CTRL-PRTSCR PRTSCR

Example

PRINT "Press a series of keys - F10 to stop"
DO
  DO
    k$ = INKEY$
  LOOP WHILE k$ = ""
  IF LEN(k$) = 1 THEN
    PRINT "Letter", k$
  ELSE
    PRINT "Scan code", ASC(MID$(k$, 2, 1))
  END IF
LOOP UNTIL MID$(k$, 2, 1) = CHR$(68) ' F10 scan code

See Also

• ASC, CHR$, LEN