Keyboard shortcuts for text mode

To write a text in an european language with a keyboard which does have the appropriate special keys, you can use the following shortcuts to create accented characters. Note that they are active regardless of the current language setting.

Shortcut Example Shortcut Example
A-' Acute ´ A-' e é A-‘ Grave ‘ A-‘ e è
A-^ Hat ˆ A-^ e ê A-" Umlaut ¨ A-" e ë
A-~ Tilde ˜ A-~ a ã A-C Cedilla ¸ A-C c ç
A-U Breve ˘ A-U g ğ A-V Check ˇ A-V s š
A-O Above ring ˚ A-O a å A-. Above dot ˙ A-. z ż
A-H Hungarian ˝ A-H o ő

Table 1. Typing accented characters.

Special characters can also be created in any language context:

Shortcuts
S-F5 a æ S-F5 A Æ S-F5 a e æ S-F5 A E Æ
S-F5 o ø S-F5 O Ø S-F5 o e œ S-F5 O E Œ
S-F5 s ß S-F5 S SS
S-F5 ! ¡ S-F5 ? ¿ S-F5 p § S-F5 P £

Table 2. Typing special characters.

When you press the " key, an appropriate quote will be inserted. The quote character is chosen according to the current language and the surrounding text. If the chosen quoting style is not appropriate, you can change it in Edit→Preferences→Keyboard→Automatic quotes. You can also insert raw quotes:

Shortcuts
S-F5 " " , , „
< tab ‹ > tab ›
< < « > > »

Table 3. Typing raw quotes.

“English” quotes are considered ligatures of two successive backticks or apostrophes. They can be created with ‘ ‘ and ' ' but these are not actual keyboard commands: the result is two characters displayed specially, not a special single character.

Some shortcuts are available in specific language contexts. You can set the text language for the whole document with Document→Language or only locally with Format→Language (see generalities for typing text).

Hungarian Spanish Polish
S-F5 o ő ! tab ¡ S-F5 a ą S-F5 o ó
S-F5 O Ő ? tab ¿ S-F5 A Ą S-F5 O Ó
S-F5 u ű ! ‘ ¡ S-F5 c ć S-F5 s ś
S-F5 U Ű ? ‘ ¿ S-F5 C Ć S-F5 S Ś
S-F5 e ę S-F5 x ź
S-F5 E Ę S-F5 X Ź
S-F5 l ł S-F5 z ż
S-F5 L Ł S-F5 Z Ż
S-F5 n ń S-F5 z tab ź
S-F5 N Ń S-F5 Z tab Ź

Table 4. Language-specific text shorthands.

Language-specific shortcuts override generic shortcuts; for example, you cannot easily type “ø” in hungarian context.

© 1998–2003 Joris van der Hoeven, David Allouche
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.1 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section entitled "GNU Free Documentation License".