Industrial keyboards are peripheral hardware devices consisting of alphanumeric keys, electromechanical buttons or sensors, which the user presses to input characters to a computer. In general, keyboards are electronic or electromechanical device for entering data into a computer, a communications system or the user interface of an instrument. Usually the keyboard communicates with the computer via a serial line. Industrial keyboards are typically connected directly to the processor, allowing the processor to scan and detect which keys are currently pressed. Keyboards utilize a variety of layouts, but the QWERTY layout is the most common. Most have keys to generate the ASCII character set as well as various function keys and special purpose keys, e.g., reset or volume control.