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Extended characters

Doug Kerr

Well-known member
As you know, in my notes there are often mathematical expressions that involve Greek letters or special mathematical symbols - those that go beyond the ASCII character set. I am never sure just which of the ways to do that will work over the spectrum of browsers, operating systems, and installed "fonts" used by the members.

Below I will give some samples of different ways to include some of these characters. I'd appreciate it if some of you could report on how each of them "makes out" on your system (and of course, please describe the pertinent aspects of your system).

Greek letter lower-case mu:
• Code page 1252 ("Windows extended ASCII - western"): µ
• Unicode (Greek alphabet): μ

Greek letter lower-case lambda:
• Unicode (Greek alphabet): λ

Plus/minus sign:
• Code page 1252 ("Windows extended ASCII - western"): ±
• Unicode: ±

Degree sign:
• Code page 1252 ("Windows extended ASCII - western"): °
• Unicode [actually the same encoding]: °

Square root sign:
• Unicode: √

Almost equal sign
• Unicode: ≈

Multiplication sign (also properly used for "by", as when giving dimensions):
• Code page 1252 ("Windows extended ASCII - western"): ×
• Unicode [actually the same encoding]: ×

Thanks.

Best regards,

Doug
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
But you need to add the PC/MAC key strokes.

I'll see if I can find some tables. The most needed is e acute or é by option-e then e.

e grave always bothers me! From Wikipedia, "On a Mac, to get a character such as à, the user must type Option-` and then the vowel. For example, to make à, the user must type Option-` and then 'a', and to make À, the user must type Option-` and then Shift-a."

Asher
 

Doug Kerr

Well-known member
Hi, Asher,

But you need to add the PC/MAC key strokes.

Recall that the question here was to help me know what characters (encoded how) I could safely put in my writings for the forum. It was not to give a tutorial on the entry of beyond-ASCII characters for others (although I'd be glad to do that, but it would be a lot of work, and there are many special exceptions and clinkers, many of which are browser-specific).

Most of the major accented letters are no problem for me, as they are in the CP-1252 character set and the basic block of Unicode. I mostly put them in with Alt+ sequences (sometimes with the Character Map applet when I forget the codes).

Here are the lower-case ones (CP-1252/Unicode):

à á â ã ä å æ ç è é ê ë ì í î ï ñ ò ó ô õ ö ù ú û ü ý ÿ

and the upper-case:

À Á Â Ã Ä Å Æ Ç È É Ê Ë Ì Í Î Ï Ñ Ó Ô Õ Ö Ù Ú Û Ý

I am optimistic that these will render properly on your Mac-based browser. If not, please let me know.

Most of my need for such is in writing French, and since we normally use French, rather than Québecois, typography here, the only uppercase accented letter I usually need is upper-case e accent aigu (É).

Thanks.

Best regards,

Doug
 

Doug Kerr

Well-known member
On a PC keyboard with a numeric cluster (either direct or with a special shift key), the following characters (all in CP-1252 and Unicode with the same code) can be entered by holding the Alt key, with it down keying nnnn as shown on the list below on the numeric cluster or equivalent, and releasing the Alt key:

_ nnnn

É 0200
Á 0193
à 0195
Ñ 0209
à 0224
á 0225
â 0226
ã 0227
ä 0228
å 0229
æ 0230
ç 0231
è 0232
é 0233
ê 0234
ë 0235
ì 0236
í 0237
î 0238
ï 0239
ñ 0241
ò 0242
ó 0243
ô 0244
õ 0245
ö 0246
œ 0156
ß 0223
© 0169
® 0174
™ 0153
« 0171
» 0187
¿ 0191
¡ 0161
µ 0181
± 0177
× 0215 (multiplication sign; should also use for "by", as in giving dimensions)
÷ 0247
• 0149
– 0150 (en dash)
— 0151 (em dash)


Other characters (such as λ, lower-case Greek lambda) are often available in the further Unicode blocks of the fonts that might be available, but keystroke entry can be quite tricky and is beyond the scope of this note. For these, the Windows Character Map applet should be used.

Best regards,

Doug
 
Below I will give some samples of different ways to include some of these characters. I'd appreciate it if some of you could report on how each of them "makes out" on your system (and of course, please describe the pertinent aspects of your system).

Hi Doug,

They all show correctly on my Windows 7 system, Firefox / Explorer / Chrome browsers.

What matters is which HTML translation is supported by the chain of events (BBS and browser version). That involves a combination of characterset used, and a font that supports it. Entering the relevant codes may be supported by a specific keyboard key layout and operating system setting, or by an ALT (on Windows) or Option (on Mac OS) plus numeric keypad key combination. Also, one can utilize helper programs to enter those characters (e.g. the 'Character Map' accessories system tool in Windows).

This website may be of some use as background information.

Cheers,
Bart
 

Doug Kerr

Well-known member
Hi, Bart,

Hi Doug,

They all show correctly on my Windows 7 system, Firefox / Explorer / Chrome browsers.

What matters is which HTML translation is supported by the chain of events (BBS and browser version). That involves a combination of characterset used, and a font that supports it. Entering the relevant codes may be supported by a specific keyboard key layout and operating system setting, or by an ALT (on Windows) or Option (on Mac OS) plus numeric keypad key combination. Also, one can utilize helper programs to enter those characters (e.g. the 'Character Map' accessories system tool in Windows).

This website may be of some use as background information.

Thank you so much for all that scoop.

Best regards,

Doug
 
Doug, thank you for the list. They all seem to work on Firefox and Chrome. Using Windows 7.

Also, especially thank you for alt+0229 for å. I always did it with CTRL+ALT+w ;-)
 
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