Skip to main content

Type Exotic Characters on Mac

In addition to all the letters and symbols you see on your keyboard, you’d be surprised at the bewildering array of special characters you can type on your Mac. 

You may already be familiar with typing accents such as for café (in which case you type either Option+E then E again or, on OS X 10.7 or later, hold down the E until you get extra options) but you’ll find there are many, many more.

Go to the Edit menu of most apps and you'll see Special Characters at the bottom. This panel gives you access to a huge range of symbols you can drag into your documents. 

Not all apps or operating systems support them, but these are mostly part of the cross-platform Unicode standard. There are probably more than you see at first, too; click the cog to reveal more.

Emoji (those fun, colourful characters available in OS X 10.7 or later) are a notable exception to this cross-platform world. They're not Apple-only, but your recipient might not be able to see them.
Labels:

Popular posts from this blog

Do Unit Conversions in Spotlight on Mac

So, everyone knows that you can do basic calculations in Spotlight, but beginning with macOS High Sierra, you can take that a step further: unit conversions. You can do specific unit conversions if the need arises, say, “13 stone in pounds” but, you can also just type in the amount and unit you want to convert, and your Mac will suggest not just the likely conversion, but also a handful of alternatives. Type in '$1299' and you'll immediately be told what that is in pounds Sterling (based presumably on what's set as your native currency in the Language & Region pane of System Preferences), and then when the window folds down to show more results, you'll see Euros, Yen and so on.
Read more

Google Snapseed Review - Photo Editor

Google Snapseed might have come pre-installed on your Android phone, but if not, it's well worth installing because it's one of the most powerful photo editors in the Google Play Store and it's completely free. Not only does Snapseed offer all the essential tools for cropping, rotating, and adjusting brightness and contrast in your photos, it's also packed with more advanced options that you'd normally expect to find in desktop photo editors. There's a dehazing tool for removing fog, smart noise reduction (great for photos taken in low light), perspective correction, selective blurring, a healing tool for correcting blemishes, and lots more. You'll need to log in using Google, Facebook or an Adobe ID, but none of Snapseed's tools are hidden behind a paywall. It's a full digital darkroom in your pocket.
Read more

VSCO Photo Editor Review

VSCO is like a more advanced version of Instagram, it has a community feature that lets you follow other VSCO photographers. You can search for contacts and Facebook friends to follow, but since it’s a relatively niche app, you might not know many other users. VSCO offers all of the tools that you’d expect from a high quality Android photo editing app, including exposure, contrast and temperature correction, as well as a very useful alignment tool for straightening horizons. There are also fade settings, and tools for skewing your image and adjusting tints. The selection of ambient filters isn’t huge, but the ones provided are very atmospheric and are adjustable via a simple slider. Once you’re done, you can share your image with VSCO’s community, send it straight to Facebook, or share it via any social networking or messaging app. The only disadvantage is that you can’t simply save an edited photo to your device; instead, you have to email it to yourself or save it to a ...
Read more