Universal way to write Unicode characters

input-methodunicodex11

I sometimes want to write special Unicode characters, like an em-dash (—), in various programs like vim, Chrome (like just now!), or LibreOffice.

In LibreOffice, I can achieve this via a dedicated dialog box found under the Insert menu. Other programs don't seem to have a built-in way. My solution in these cases is to look up the character on Wikipedia, copy it, and paste it in.

Is there a universal way to write Unicode characters in any program that accepts text input in Linux without having to copy and paste from somewhere where it's already printed?

Best Answer

Either you can enable an Compose key, or you can press CtrlShiftU followed by the Unicode hexadecimal number of the character (leading zeroes can be skipped). For example, Æ is CtrlShiftU, then C6. This works on GNOME Terminal, Terminator, Google Chrome and a number of other applications, with Xterm (and according to comments, Emacs) not working.

On GNOME, to enable Compose, go to the Keyboard settings, then Shortcuts → Typing → Alternative Characters Key and map it to something (say, Right Alt). Then you press the Compose key, and - thrice to get an em-dash: —. (The arrows in this paragraph are all Compose->.)

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Entering Unicode characters by name

I would think Autokey would do the job as described here. The idea is that Autokey is always running and can accept arbitrary strings as triggers.

As the post describes, you just need to set up Autokey to paste unicode characters and as a trigger it could accept something like /delta, which it then replaces with a δ.

Unicode Characters in Mutt Attachments

Please see the explanations of rfc2047_parameters in manual for muttrc for details.

Simply add,

set rfc2047_parameters = yes

to your .muttrc

Best Answer

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Unicode Characters in Mutt Attachments

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