The ket combination that is commonly known as “Ctrl-Alt-Canc” (“Canc” in Italian is the shortcut for “Cancella”, or “Delete”) is a keyboard shortcut that is rarely used nowadays. Depending of the operating systems, it can open the task manager (Windows) or execute specific programs but also terminate the current session (Linux). But on the old DOS systems it had a more drastic effect: in fact, it immediately reset the computer!
The combination “Ctrl-Alt-Del” has its roots in the past, and like all the oldest stories, this one has its mistery too, because the inventor of this shortcut is universally known to be David Bradley, an IBM engineer, but behind this name another one appears, a name of a little computer manufacturer of Bountiful (Utah, USA), Michael Donald Wise.
Michael Donald Wise
Michael D. Wise founded Sphere Computer in 1975 to sell what the “Byte” magazine considers was the very first personal computer, the Sphere I. This computer was different from the other computers of that time: it was a complete computer sold with all the necessary components to use it (main board, keyboard, monitor). Moreover, the computer could be purchased in an assembled case, thing that made this system the first personal computer ever. Michael Wise had introduced a key combination to restart his computer without having to power off the system all the times. Despite the good sellings of the Sphere I, Sphere Computer shut down in a couple of years and, maybe, the poor diffusion of these computers is the reason why people doesn’t know about Wise and his reset key shortcut. He had invented a very simple but working system: he had connected 2 keys at the pin reset of the computer’s microprocessor. Nothing happened when the user pressed those keys separately, but if they were pressed together, they sent an electrical signal that reset the CPU.
David Bradley
At the end of the Seventies, IBM was selling several computer, but all of them were aimed to the medium/high-end market. The low-end market was dominated by microcomputers like Commodore PET and Apple II. IBM decided to enter in that market and started developing a brand-new computer, the PC. Both software and hardware were fairly new and developers continuously experienced system crashes of the computer on which they were working. The procedure to restart the computer was simple: the user had to power off the system, wait for ten seconds to let the capacitors to completely discharge themselves so that the memories could loose their datas, then power on again the computer. After these steps, the user had to load again the operating system, taking several other seconds. As we said, crashes were very common so the waste of time was huge.
David Bradley, an IBM engineer that was developing the BIOS of the PC, had an idea: invent something that allow an user to restart the system without having to stand up to power off the computer. So he thinked about a key combination that, when pressed, could reset the system. The first choise was for “Ctrl-Alt-Esc” keys but later he choosed “Ctrl-Alt-Del”: the first combination used some keys that were too near each other so that they could be pressed inadvertently, while the second one forced the user to use both his hands to activate the reset sequence because the “Del” key was far away from the “Ctrl” and “Alt” keys. Unline the hardware system used by Wise in his computers, this key combination was intercepted by the BIOS, so that the reset was managed by software.
This key combination was found so useful that, despite IBM decided not to spread it out of its offices so that only its engineers could use it, “Ctrl-Alt-Del” left the secret rooms of the company starting to be widely used by all the PC owners.
A funny story is related to “Ctrl-Alt-Del”. During a gathering for the 20th anniversary of the PC, Bradley told: “I may have invented control-alt-delete, but Bill Gates made it really famous“, referring to the continuous crashes of the first versions of Windows operating system.
