Notebook
A notebook (also notepad, writing pad, etc.) is a virgin book of paper on which notes may be written. It was invented in 1920 by Australian J. A Birchall, who first stuck paper together and added a cardboard backing, rather than leaving it to be loose leaf. The paper may be blank or include pre-printed horizontal and/or vertical lines to assist the writer in keeping the text straight. While many people use notepads in their daily lives, they are most commonly associated with students, who often carry individual notebooks in order to take notes for different courses they take in school.
Artists often use large notebooks which include wide spaces of blank paper appropriate for drawing. Lawyers are also known for using rather large notebooks frequently known as legal pads that contain lined paper (often yellow in color) and are appropriate for use on tables and desks. These horizontal lines or "rules" are sometimes classified according to their space apart with "wide rule" the farthest, "college rule" closer, "legal rule" slightly closer and "narrow rule" closest, allowing more lines of text per page. When sewn into a pasteboard backing, these may be called composition books, or in smaller signatures may be called "blue books" or exam books and used for essay exams. In contrast, journalists prefer small, hand-held notebooks for portability (often called reporters' notebooks), and sometimes use shorthand when taking notes. Scientists and other researchers use lab notebooks to document their experiments. The pages in lab notebooks are sometimes graph paper to make it easier to plot data.
It is frequently cheaper to purchase notebooks that are spiral-bound, meaning that a spiral of wire is looped through large perforations at the top or side of the page. Other bound notebooks are available that use glue to hold the pages together; this process is commonly referred to as "padding". Today it is common for pages in such notebooks to include a thin line of perforations that make it easier to tear out the page. Spiral-bound pages can be torn out but frequently leave thin scraggly strips from the small amount of paper that is within the spiral, as well as an uneven rip along the top of the torn-out page. A moleskine notebook includes a sewn spine that allows it to lie flat.
Since the late 20th century, many attempts have been made to integrate the simplicity of a notebook with the editing and searching abilities of a computer. Laptop computers began to be called notebooks when they reached a relatively small size in the 1990s, but they did not have any special note-taking ability. Personal digital assistants (PDAs) came next, integrating small liquid crystal displays with a touch-sensitive layer to input graphics and written text. Tablet PCs are considerably larger and provide more writing and navigation space. The fictional PADD of Star Trek is frequently seen as inspiration for PDAs and tablet PCs, but the first PADD was seen in "Encounter at Farpoint" in 1987, after the first flat calculator-like PDA was made in 1978.
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