Patent ID: 8179290

Claim:
An electronic apparatus comprising: a key operation unit comprising at least one of a first region in which a first key group is arranged and a second region in which a second key group is arranged; a key code generation unit configured to generate, when a first key of the first key group is pressed, two key codes including a key code assigned to the first key and a key code assigned to a key located at a position in the second region which corresponds to a position of the first key in the first region, and to generate, when a second key of the second key group is pressed, two key codes including a key code assigned to the second key and a key code assigned to a key located at a position in the first region which corresponds to a position of the second key in the second region; and a key operation control unit configured to select one character string from a plurality of character strings obtained by combinations of exclusively selecting the two key codes generated by the key code generation unit, and to output a key code representing the selected character string.