How To Type Special Characters Using The ‘ALT’ Key.

Have you ever Wondered how someone makes a ‘±’ , ‘µ’ or even a ™ (Trademark) with a Keyboard?

Computer systems based on Western English language use a particular character set known as US-ASCII or simply ASCII, which may or may not contain the characters we need. These character set has been replaced by the ISO 1 character set that contains more foreign individual characters. Typically, a character set includes a lot more characters than we use in the course of normal writing. We can access these “hidden” characters by using a modifier key, most commonly the ‘Alt’ key (for windows).

Getting things started :-

Make sure ‘Num lock’ is on!

All you need to do is Hold down your “ALT” key and press another key/keys on the keyboard to create a symbol. It’s that easy!

Here is a list of some you can make. Have Fun!!

Alt +0162 = ¢ , Alt +0163 = £ , Alt +0165 = ¥ , Alt + 0128 = €

Alt +0169 = © , Alt +0174= ® , Alt + 0153 = ™ , Alt + 0161 =  ¡

Alt +0177 = ±  , Alt +0191  = ¿ , Alt +0215 = × , Alt + 0247 = ÷

Alt +0190 = ¾  , Alt +145  = æ , Alt + 155 = ¢ ,  Alt + 156 = £

Alt + 157 = ¥ ,  Alt +159 = ƒ ,  Alt + 171 = ½ ,  Alt + 172 = ¼

Alt + 225 = ß , Alt + 230 = µ , Alt + 241 = ± , Alt + 0134 = †

NOTE:-

* This only works with programs which accept an ASCII input, such as email, Notepad, WordPad, MS-WORD etc. Programs that do not support this feature may render the character as a question mark (?).

* This only works with the ‘ON’ number pad key on Desktops. These codes may not work with laptops or notebooks which does not consists of ‘Num lock’ key.