Comments on: Stupid Good Trick of the Day http://academhack.outsidethetext.com/home/2007/stupid-good-trick-of-the-day/ Tech Tools for Academics Sat, 10 Jan 2009 00:40:59 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5.1 By: dave http://academhack.outsidethetext.com/home/2007/stupid-good-trick-of-the-day/#comment-10902 dave Thu, 10 May 2007 19:25:38 +0000 http://academhack.outsidethetext.com/home/?p=175#comment-10902 Curt, I personally would use "option+e+vowel" combo for the above situation, but its nice to have options. Also there are some accents that you can't get thru the "option+e+vowel" combo. I also find that there are applications which do not render the option+e+vowel correctly. But as you point out using text replacers has the down side of not preserving italics, although there are ways to fix that as well. Curt,
I personally would use “option+e+vowel” combo for the above situation, but its nice to have options. Also there are some accents that you can’t get thru the “option+e+vowel” combo. I also find that there are applications which do not render the option+e+vowel correctly. But as you point out using text replacers has the down side of not preserving italics, although there are ways to fix that as well.

]]> By: G. Curt Fiedler http://academhack.outsidethetext.com/home/2007/stupid-good-trick-of-the-day/#comment-10887 G. Curt Fiedler Thu, 10 May 2007 17:29:12 +0000 http://academhack.outsidethetext.com/home/?p=175#comment-10887 Dave - so using "xresume" means you have to remember something extra. Using the built-in accent functions in OSX word processors may be better, as you only have to memorize the global "option+e, vowel" combo. But to each his/her own. :-) Dave - so using “xresume” means you have to remember something extra.

Using the built-in accent functions in OSX word processors may be better, as you only have to memorize the global “option+e, vowel” combo.

But to each his/her own. :-)

]]> By: dave http://academhack.outsidethetext.com/home/2007/stupid-good-trick-of-the-day/#comment-10699 dave Wed, 09 May 2007 02:54:42 +0000 http://academhack.outsidethetext.com/home/?p=175#comment-10699 Jimmy, If you want to differentiate you could set it to if you type "xresume" to turn it into "resumé", or whatever else you want instead of "x" something like z or punctuation. Jimmy,
If you want to differentiate you could set it to if you type “xresume” to turn it into “resumé”, or whatever else you want instead of “x” something like z or punctuation.

]]> By: jenn http://academhack.outsidethetext.com/home/2007/stupid-good-trick-of-the-day/#comment-10667 jenn Tue, 08 May 2007 19:45:58 +0000 http://academhack.outsidethetext.com/home/?p=175#comment-10667 why didn't i think of this?? why didn’t i think of this??

]]> By: Jimmy http://academhack.outsidethetext.com/home/2007/stupid-good-trick-of-the-day/#comment-10664 Jimmy Tue, 08 May 2007 19:21:46 +0000 http://academhack.outsidethetext.com/home/?p=175#comment-10664 How does it handle words that have an accented form and an un-accented form for 2 different meanings?... like resume and resumé? How does it handle words that have an accented form and an un-accented form for 2 different meanings?… like resume and resumé?

]]> By: G. Curt Fiedler http://academhack.outsidethetext.com/home/2007/stupid-good-trick-of-the-day/#comment-10101 G. Curt Fiedler Wed, 02 May 2007 18:47:31 +0000 http://academhack.outsidethetext.com/home/?p=175#comment-10101 I've avoided using TextExpander and its clones on Macs because they have problems handling italics. As a biologist, I use many latin names for species. These need to be italicized. But because not all fonts have italics versions, TextExpander won't allow a general short cut for italicized text. Given that I use MS Word for most of my writing, I also find that its shortcuts work well enough for many of my needs. As for accents, if you use them a lot you can remember the keyboard combos in my experience. You don't need to go to the Special Characters menu - at least on Macs. If you need an accent over an "e" or any other vowel, you hit "option + e" at the same time, then type the letter you want accented: é, á, í, ó, ú. Granted, this is one more key press than having a shortcut set up. However, it allows you to make an accent for any letter, not just in a few select words you plop into TextExpander. I recall that you use Quicksilver from your previous posts (me too). This requires that you remember many key combos to launch and manipulate files. If you can remember those key combos, I'll bet you can remember "option + e". Another, inelegant, method is to do a find and replace throughout your entire document for those words you want accented. Then again, that doesn't help when you need to add large amounts of text at a later time. I’ve avoided using TextExpander and its clones on Macs because they have problems handling italics. As a biologist, I use many latin names for species. These need to be italicized. But because not all fonts have italics versions, TextExpander won’t allow a general short cut for italicized text.

Given that I use MS Word for most of my writing, I also find that its shortcuts work well enough for many of my needs. As for accents, if you use them a lot you can remember the keyboard combos in my experience. You don’t need to go to the Special Characters menu - at least on Macs.

If you need an accent over an “e” or any other vowel, you hit “option + e” at the same time, then type the letter you want accented: é, á, í, ó, ú. Granted, this is one more key press than having a shortcut set up. However, it allows you to make an accent for any letter, not just in a few select words you plop into TextExpander.

I recall that you use Quicksilver from your previous posts (me too). This requires that you remember many key combos to launch and manipulate files. If you can remember those key combos, I’ll bet you can remember “option + e”.

Another, inelegant, method is to do a find and replace throughout your entire document for those words you want accented. Then again, that doesn’t help when you need to add large amounts of text at a later time.

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