EDIT Carriage Return (Ctrl-M) Move the cursor to the beginning of the line.

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EDIT History On teletype equipment, this control code returned the print head carriage to the beginning of the same line. On a well adjusted machine, the return trip took the same amount of time required to transmit one character, so the CR was always followed by an LF.

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EDIT Modern Usage With the advent of video terminals, the need for extra characters after the carriage return was eliminated. On most machines, the Return or Enter key produces a single CR character.

Since Microsoft's first product, Microsoft Basic, was designed for use with teletypes and punched tape, it's products all use the original CR and LF pair to signify the end of one line and the beginning of another in text streams and files.

Most, if not all, other personal computer manufacturers opted to use a single CR as a newline. The Macintosh Operating system uses this convention.

Unix, on the other hand, uses a single LF for newline.

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EDIT Suggested Implementation Because of the disparity in usage many devices and programs have the user configurable option of automatically executing an LF after a CR.

For maximum compatibility, implementaions should move to the beginning of the next line after receiving a CR and ignore any LF immediately following.

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