·Sweet·
·.·
Also, it’s at the right of row six, Character Map, Arial Font
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Yes, in fact the International System of Units (SI) rejects the middle dot as a “decimal mark”. Decimal separator - Wikipedia
That would be ALT+227 : π
NumLock must be ON for this to work – some keyboards default it to OFF,
Perhaps his intention was to write 10π – 28. He didn’t say explicitly.
People are just assuming out the wazoo here.
I know you’re right, but why the heck is it like this?
You can’t fool me, there’s no x in algebra. That would be algebrax.
Weird, never heard of that before either. But I always thought the middle dot was supposed to represent multiplication, but we typically use asterisk instead because it’s easier/on the keyboard already.
Although the middle and bottom dot look similar enough to humans, to a computer, they are as different as A is from Z. If you are using one in a spreadsheet as a decimal point or a multiplication sign, you’d better be damn sure the program knows what you mean or you’ll be sorry.
This reminds me that in earlier versions of the Mac OS, there was a control panel that let you indicate what character you wanted to serve as the decimal point. I used to reset it to the middle dot just because I liked the look of it and that computer was only for my personal use anyway. But with OSX, that option was removed. I think now you can only choose from some preset options.
And where does one find the character map utility? Also, typing Alt 0183 just makes the computer try to perform other operations. I’ve never figured out how to use the character map.
Is num-lock on and are you using the numeric keypad? shijinn’s instructions are missing those two important points.
character map
windows XP
start-> all programs -> accessories -> system tools -> character map
What parts of the world use a comma for a decimal point?
Quebec, for one. (Scroll down to the paragraphs under “Calendrier de réalisation”). This is in French, not English.
The Royal Society of Chemistry journals still enforce the use of the multiplication sign (that’s ALT-0215 in Windows, not sure about OS X) instead of an X. It’s raised a bit higher and it’s sans serif, even in a serif font. I use it all the time now when writing as it just looks cleaner.
When I was at school (in the UK, in the 1970s/80s)…
Multiplication was denoted by a small centred X (probably officially the character asterion describes). I remember being taught that it could also be represented by a dot, or implied in the case of parentheses (which were called ‘brackets’) - i.e. 2(x-y)
In algebra, where the unknown value X was involved, it was a cursive X, written with two grazing curved strokes, was used to differentiate it from the multiplication symbol
Decimal points, in handwritten form, were the central dot described by the OP. On computers, I guess they would have been the same as the full stop (period) character, but there were only two computers in the whole school when I was there and I never got to touch them.
The symbol for division was a short horizontal line with a dot above and below (like a colon superimposed on a dash or minus) - this confused the hell out of me when I later visited countries where that’s the symbol for subtraction. Especially as I was working in an accounting role for those trips.
Same here (except I was in school in the UK in the '50s and '60s). Wiki tells me that that what you and I learned as the division sign is properly called the Obelus, and can be produced, in Windows with Alt+0247 or Alt+246 on the number pad (I can’t find it in Character Map).
I have a laptop, so no keypad. That would explain it, I guess.