| * |
Examples of how to produce French Accents on a Macintosh.
We would like to thank "Al" Poulin for providing the
following information.
Francis A. Poulin, is a Member, American-French Genealogical Society
Suggestions regarding producing French accents on a
Macintosh.
|
There are basically three approaches; the first two work on any
Macintosh:
(1) Note use of a small chart,
(2) use of Key Caps, and
(3) use of the Canadian French keyboard layout |
|
|
| NOTE: In the first two methods described below, the French
accents do NOT work in UPPER CASE, whether by using caps lock or the
shift key.
To get accents on upper case vowels, the Canadian French keyboard
layout is the only capability. The upper case letter then
shrinks in height to accommodate the accent. |
|
(1) The small chart.
This works on any Macintosh, including very old ones, with most of
the standard fonts.
Most accented characters need a combination of two keys, plus the
desired character.
| Diacritical mark |
Key combination |
| Grave accent (`) |
Option-`, then character desired |
| Acute accent (´) |
Option-e, then character desired |
| Circumflex (^) |
Option-i, then character desired |
| Tilde (~) |
Option-n, then character desired |
| Umlaut (¨) |
Option-u, then character desired |
| Letter "c" with cedilla (ç) |
Option-c |
| The option key combinations will work
only with legitimate accent/letter combinations. |
|
|
(2) Key Caps.
Open Key Caps in the Apple Menu. This presents the lower case
keys on the screen. Press Shift to see the upper case
keys. Press Option to get a large set of symbols including
those presented in the small chart above. Notice that the
accent keys have shaded borders;
option-clicking on any one of these and then releasing will
highlight those few character keys (including spacebar) which can
legitimately be affected.
Press Shift-Option for yet another large set of symbols, but
notice that the accent keys already seen do not change and remain
available for use with upper case characters. While Key Caps
is active, one can practice the same keystrokes as given in the
chart above, without affecting documents at hand. With the more
recent operating systems, the Finder Help utility which appears on
the desktop can lead the user through this capability. |
|
(3) Canadian French Keyboard Layout.
This capability first appeared in one of the later OS 7.5
varients. Open the Keyboard Control Panel to view the set of
international keyboards available. Rather than describing the
brief process here, the user should go to the Finder Help, search
for "accent" or "fonts" and follow the
process. This establishes a new pull down menu that appears in
the upper right corner. The two choices should be French
Canadian and U.S. When in French Canadian mode, use Key Caps
as described above to discover the use of those keys that change
function. |
|
|
NOTE: Treatment of the ligatures (or diphthongs) æ and ¦.
Words for the second one include ¦il, ¦uf, and ¦uvre. In
case the fonts do not translate well on your screen, I'm referring
to the characters ae and oe, each presented as one
character.
| Diacritical mark |
Key combination |
| Ligature (æ) |
Option-apostrophe |
| Ligature (¦) |
Option-q |
However, on the Canadian French keyboard layout, the
first ligature (æ) is at Option-semi-colon. |
|
Printer
Friendly Version PDF |
* |
