[DM-MUG] How to type special characters, like Ł

[Matthew Nuzum]

On Wed, Aug 31, 2011 at 7:25 AM, Bailey Ford <bailey at me.com> wrote:

>
> I'm glad there was a relatively easy way to type the characters that you
> needed, but sometimes the character you want just isn't typeable in the
> usual sense. For example, who can type "⇒" or "⌘" ? I thought I'd cover how
> to fix that up. There are four parts of the Mac operating system that are
> useful here. The Keyboard preference pane (1) has a little check box that
> will show the Keyboard and Character viewers in the menu bar. The Keyboard
> Viewer (2) shows a picture of the keyboard that you are using and, as you
> hold down modifier keys, show what each key will type. If you are a new user
> and have never seen this, it is pretty nifty. The keyboard viewer is hugely
> useful for figuring out what and how you can type. The Character viewer (3)
> shows everything under the sun – even the characters that can't be typed.
> You scroll around to find the character you want, then double-click and it
> will be pasted where you were typing. The Character viewer has a nice
> Favorites feature, so you don't have to go looking for your obscure
> character when you need it later. Lastly, if you find that you have some
> character or little snippet that you are typing frequently, check out the
> Language and Text preference pane (4). Under the Text tab, you will find a
> little area that does text substitution. You can make up some name for the
> weird character you need, and set it up so that the mac replaces that name
> for the symbol whenever you type it. For example, when I type 'cmdkey' I
> get ⌘. This works in lots of places, but isn't quite supported everywhere.
> It does work in the spotlight menu, so you can always just use it there and
> copy-paste into anything.
>

Thanks, awesome tips. That onscreen keyboard is very nice and the favorites
feature of the character viewer. I also find myself typing the British pound
symbol as well as degrees and US cents symbols, so I will check out the text
substitution feature.


-- 
Matthew Nuzum
newz2000 on freenode, skype, linkedin and twitter

♫ You're never fully dressed without a smile! ♫
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