All connector styles are designed to assure proper orientation of the mating halves prior to mating, and provide engagement between mated shells prior to terminus engagement and have the termini so located as to be protected from handling damage.

This connector has no retaining screws to secure the connectors together, and ribbon cables are both inconveniently wide and somewhat delicate, so this connector style was primarily used for connections inside of a computer or peripheral enclosure (as opposed to connecting two enclosures to each other).

An Apple Mouse packaged for the IIc, it coincided with a minor change in the mouse mechanism and connector style.

This same connector style is used for many of Sharp's mobile phone models.

Some connector styles may contain both pin and socket connection types.

Molex developed and patented the first examples of this connector style in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

ITT Corporation (ITT Interconnect Solutions) business portfolio includes the brands Cannon, VEAM, and BIW, and is the foremost manufacturer of Type "AN", MS and MS-type connectors with the widest range of connector styles, sizes and variations in the industry.