Morse code prosigns or procedural signals are special dot/dash sequence symbols e.g. (·  — ·  —) that for the most part do not represent written or printed alpha-numeric or punctuation text characters. Morse code prosigns are special (normally unwritten) symbols, that have particular functions, such as: indicating changes of transmission communications protocol status, and indicating (or initiating) textual white space formatting. These special Morse symbols, although preceding modern teleprinter (teletypewriter) and computer character set control characters by many decades, play a role similar to the (normally unprinted) control characters of modern computer and teleprinter character set codes such as the: Baudot, Murray, ITA2, ASCII, Unicode and EBCDIC codes. Morse code prosign symbols have been used by telegraphers (AmE) / telegraphists (BrE) for over 140 years, predating modern character set code control characters by many decades. Traditionally Morse code is encoded or sent manually by telegraphists using hand operated telegraph keys and decoded or copied as the Morse signals are received by ear in real time. Morse prosigns mostly constitute unique dot/dash sequence code symbols separate from those of alpha-numeric and punctuation Morse character symbols and have the same status as the normally written symbols. Mastery of prosigns and their usage is an important part of becoming a fluent telegrapher / telegraphist.