Quickly Write Accented Characters 9
Tip
Hey
In a multi-cultural, multi-langage world there is various different characters and letters which appear in every day language. One of the main characters which appear quite a lot is accented characters (è). Normally you would have to open up the character palette find the letter you want out of the millions that exist and then insert it into your document. You would then have to repeat this process over again with the different characters. That takes a long time. But you can use a handy little shortcut.
To write accented characters press the Alt key and then the tilda key (`). This tilda key is also known as a back tick. It is usually next to the number one key. When you press this key a small yellow box will appear. Then simply press the letter you want to accent. These includes a,e,i,o,u. The result is as follows: à è ì ò ù.
You can also do this for captial letters, simply press Shift and type your letter you want to turn into a captial letter. For example: À È Ì Ò Ù. Another quick trick in accenting characters it to press and hold the character. You can then produce a whole line of accented e’s. For example ÈÈÈÈÈÈ. Simple
Although this is a simple trick it is very useful. I can now write Exposè really quickly without having to hunt for the character or just replace it with a normal e. No more hunting another reason why Macs are so cool.
P.S Sorry for the complete lack of posts. I have had loads of Uni course work all pile in, as a result this website had to take a back seat. I should have enough time for posts over the next couple of days.
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9 Responses to “Quickly Write Accented Characters”
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1
The tilde is this symbol (~). It is used in Spanish to put over the ñ in Español and a number of other words. The ñ actually has a place in the Spanish alphabet, so it’s pretty crucial to Spanish.
I believe the symbol you are discussing is simply known as a back-tick. I’m not totally positive though.
I just thought I would pass that along.
Comment By caudillmiller on November 20th, at 11:57 pm
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2
was wondering is there a way to add a tilda over the “n” with a shortcut
Comment By Jordan on November 21st, at 12:08 am
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You know, Exposè is actually spelled Exposé – acute accent, not grave accent. That’s é typed Alt-e then e.
And technically tilde is the character ~, although I know the Spanish (or maybe Latin Americans) call all marks tildes: they use both ~ and ´.Comment By Gordon on November 21st, at 12:08 am
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4
I use accent marks a lot, so I am used to finding and using them. But at least the tilde and the French accent grave (or back-tick) are actually on the keys. The German umlaut (option-u + vowel), as in fröliche, the cedilla (option-c), as in français, and the accent aigü (option-e + vowel), as in Exposé (sorry, but it is NOT Exposè) are all similarly used. (Darn it, I can’t remember if aigü is spelled with or without an e….) I may be missing some others, but I’m usually only typing French or German.
Comment By DeeAnne Lau on November 21st, at 1:04 am
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There are a simpler ways to do it: just select a different keyboard, or, activate keyboard viewer to get the character you want _or_ use the Portuguese one.
It has all the accented characters you may need, so you write in English _and_ any other language without change the keyboard. I write down with felt pen on the keycaps the ones I use most…
Comment By Luiz E. C Pellanda on November 21st, at 12:00 pm
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6
§§a§êẽẽệ
î®^rôâ
⌥i + i = î
⌥i + a = â
enz.⌥n + n = ñ
⌥n + o = õ
enz.⌥u + u = ü
⌥u + n = ï
enz.⌥e + e = é
⌥e + a = á
enz.⌥` + e = è
⌥` + i = ì
enz.Comment By Django on November 21st, at 3:16 pm
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7
for some reason the capitalized letters do not get accented when i try your trick.
by the way, in german you do not have to accent capital letters instead you combine, ie Ae, Oe, Ue. german does not accent e. it is also acceptable to use the letter combination when not capitalizing so for example froehlich (it’s spelled with an “h” as it is derived from froh), you can also write ueblich. it all is good, just a bit of an eye sore if you want to be a stickler.Comment By Patricia on November 24th, at 12:07 am
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@Patricia – I am terribly sorry about the misspelling and misaccenting. I was typing “off the cuff” and should have been using a dictionary. I am so embarrassed. I usually am using French, so I should have stayed within that language.
I do know that some fonts will provide the combined vowels. But for those, I do have to look them up in either the keyboard viewer or, my personal favorite, PopChar.
At least I am not having to run back and forth between completely different keyboard sets – like Chinese or Cyrillic – and English!
Comment By DeeAnne Lau on November 30th, at 5:08 pm
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9
√鮥 îñ†é®è߆ïñg
Comment By steve Davis on December 2nd, at 4:15 pm