# Special symbols, redux **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 9, 2004, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/special-symbols-redux/268414 "2004-10-09T23:23:48Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![dougie\_monty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@dougie\_monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dougie_monty)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2004, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/special-symbols-redux/268414/1 "2004-10-09T23:23:48Z")
In a post added in 1999, I asked about rendering various foreign characters on a computer keyboard, such as the a and the o with the tilde (from Portuguese), and the a and the e with the cedilla (from Polish). That post showed how to get various accented characters by using the Alt key and the numeric keypad, for example: Alt + 123={ Alt + 189= ╜ Alt + 0201=É But the accented characters I mentioned above haven’t appeared. Is there some directory online for this? 😕 Thanks very much. ---
**Author:** ![Orbifold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/779978/32.png) [@Orbifold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Orbifold)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2004, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/special-symbols-redux/268414/2 "2004-10-09T23:54:31Z")
If you’re using Windows, select “Run” from the start menu and run the program “charmap”. That program will let you cut-and-paste special characters into other programs, and also gives the keyboard shortcuts for them. “ã” should be alt+0227, and “õ” should be alt+0245. I can’t find a or e with a cedilla in the list, though. I found all of these a’s: “àáâãäåǎạảấầẩẫậắằẳẵặ”, but nothing with a cedilla. ---
**Author:** ![dougie\_monty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@dougie\_monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dougie_monty)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2004, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/special-symbols-redux/268414/3 "2004-10-09T23:59:43Z")
> [@Orbifold](#): > > If you’re using Windows, select “Run” from the start menu and run the program “charmap”. That program will let you cut-and-paste special characters into other programs, and also gives the keyboard shortcuts for them. > > “ã” should be alt+0227, and “õ” should be alt+0245. I can’t find a or e with a cedilla in the list, though. I found all of these a’s: “àáâãäåǎạảấầẩẫậắằẳẵặ”, but nothing with a cedilla. Thanx 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/46a35a/32.png) [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2004, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/special-symbols-redux/268414/4 "2004-10-10T05:04:15Z")
Here’s a page that contains the [most common accented characters](http://www.pgdp.net/c/faq/document.php#a_chars). It also has a print-friendly pdf version that you can print out and keep near your keyboard. ---
**Author:** ![dougie\_monty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@dougie\_monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dougie_monty)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2004, 7:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/special-symbols-redux/268414/5 "2004-10-12T07:18:21Z")
> [@t-bonham@scc.net](#): > > Here’s a page that contains the [most common accented characters](http://www.pgdp.net/c/faq/document.php#a_chars). It also has a print-friendly pdf version that you can print out and keep near your keyboard. Thanks…I tried that. It has the a and o for Portuguese, but not the a and e with cedilla, for Polish. ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2004, 10:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/special-symbols-redux/268414/6 "2004-10-12T10:35:16Z")
It’s not a cedilla, it’s an [ogonek](http://studweb.euv-frankfurt-o.de/twardoch/f/en/typo/ogonek/ogonek.html). To get it, you need to have an appropriate font, and I believe you need to use Unicode. This [Wikipedia page](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ogonek) gives you the codes you need for the characters. If you haven’t got the right fonts then you won’t be able to see them - I can see the a, e, i and u with ogonek, but not the o for some reason. The codes you want are **ą** for **ą** and **ę** for **ę**. The SDMB doesn’t support HTML entity codes like this so I have cut and pasted the a-ogonek and e-ogonek in this post. Actually, on preview, the board is automatically replacing the codes with the characters, so it looks like it does work. Those codes are & # 2 6 1 ; and & # 2 8 1 ;. (Remove the spaces.) ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2004, 10:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/special-symbols-redux/268414/7 "2004-10-12T10:45:52Z")
[http://studweb.euv-frankfurt-o.de/twardoch/f/en/charsets/html4\_0unicode2\_0.html](http://studweb.euv-frankfurt-o.de/twardoch/f/en/charsets/html4_0unicode2_0.html) This is a large list of Unicode codes for all manner of weird and wonderful characters, from **ă** to **ź**. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2004, 12:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/special-symbols-redux/268414/8 "2004-10-12T12:31:06Z")
And it needs to be pointed out that VBB and Unicode have a rather strange relationship. It would be nice to say that VBB accepts Unicode characters; it would be useful, though not nice, to say that it rejects the coding or a C&P for them. But it appears that neither is the case – it takes the coding and converts it to symbols it can represent, sometimes being happy with what it gets and representing it accurately, and sometimes coming up with the Small Square Box or a random bizarre symbol. Perhaps **Gaudere** or another technically adept person could speak more to this; I merely report the empirical results. ---
**Author:** ![wolf\_meister](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolf_meister/32/15202_2.png) [@wolf\_meister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolf_meister)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2004, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/special-symbols-redux/268414/9 "2004-10-12T13:59:53Z")
Here’s a page from my website: [http://www.1728.com/altchar.htm](http://www.1728.com/altchar.htm) It may not have all the characters that you want but to me it’s easier to view than a character map. ---
**Author:** ![wolf\_meister](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolf_meister/32/15202_2.png) [@wolf\_meister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolf_meister)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2004, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/special-symbols-redux/268414/10 "2004-10-12T14:10:50Z")
Now that I think of it, I have a page of those HTML character entities that Colophon was talking about: [http://www.1728.com/codes.htm](http://www.1728.com/codes.htm) ---
**Author:** ![dougie\_monty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@dougie\_monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dougie_monty)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2004, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/special-symbols-redux/268414/11 "2004-10-12T18:59:23Z")
> [@Colophon](#): > > The codes you want are **ą** for **ą** and **ę** for **ę**. The SDMB doesn’t support HTML entity codes like this so I have cut and pasted the a-ogonek and e-ogonek in this post. > > Actually, on preview, the board is automatically replacing the codes with the characters, so it looks like it does work. Those codes are & # 2 6 1 ; and & # 2 8 1 ;. (Remove the spaces.) Thanks to all. 🙂 Colophon, does that set of characters mean that you hold the “Alt” key down and push, in order, the ampersand, pound sign, two, six, one, and semicolon? And in your subsequent post, is that character in the Unicode URL (just before the “.html” suffix) a zero or the letter “O”? Thanks very much. ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2004, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/special-symbols-redux/268414/12 "2004-10-12T19:26:27Z")
> [@dougie\_monty](#): > > Thanks to all. 🙂 > Colophon, does that set of characters mean that you hold the “Alt” key down and push, in order, the ampersand, pound sign, two, six, one, and semicolon? No. Those codes are only for use in HTML, andf you just enter them as above, and the browser renders them as the correct character. For other applications, I’m not sure how you can get them, short of copying and pasting from a web browser. > [@](#): > > And in your subsequent post, is that character in the Unicode URL (just before the “.html” suffix) a zero or the letter “O”? > Thanks very much. A zero. Does clicking on the link not work for you? It does for me. ---
**Author:** ![dougie\_monty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@dougie\_monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dougie_monty)\ **Post date:** [October 12, 2004, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/special-symbols-redux/268414/13 "2004-10-12T19:34:19Z")
> [@Colophon](#): > > No. Those codes are only for use in HTML, andf you just enter them as above, and the browser renders them as the correct character. For other applications, I’m not sure how you can get them, short of copying and pasting from a web browser. > > A zero. Does clicking on the link not work for you? It does for me. So in other words, to put those characters between the \< and \> symbols, as to get italic characters by keying in \ and \ ? I’m sorry to sound so simplistic, but I have absolutely no experience in producing accented characters via html. Zero? Thanks. I sometimes write URL’s down because I can’t stay at a computer, and maybe the next time I’m at home I want to go directly to that site rather than stopping at the SDMB first. 🙂