It has been a week since I posted my first installment. This second installment about accented text on Mac OS X will simply summarize all the key codes I could find for the extended US keyboard layout. I did discover in the past week that there are a few key combinations that work with the default US keyboard layout. I will start off with those.
Dead Keys for Macintosh US Default Keyboard Layout
Use these key combinations to add accent marks to various characters. Keys in the combination should be pressed at the same time. These combinations work with the Macintosh default keyboard layout. In all cases the ALT key may be substituted for the OPTION key.| Description | Key Combination | Example |
|---|---|---|
| tilde | OPTION + n | ã |
| grave | OPTION + ` | à |
| acute | OPTION + e | í |
| diaeresis or umlaut | OPTION + u | ë |
| circumflex | OPTION + i | û |
| cedilla (c) | OPTION + c | ç |
I did find some additional key combinations listed for the default layout however they did not work for me on OS X 10.5. Either they produced a result different from what was listed or they performed some other function. I will investigate further and update this article as I find reliable information on why this is the case.
Next we have the key combinations for the US extended keyboard layout. The extended layout has many more options and is definitely more flexible.