Hi everybody.
I was wondering why the default alt-a on Colemak give us á ? As I am french , it would have been more convenient to have à instead.
So my question is, is the á in use in some langages and how frequent it is ?
Thanks
Colemak forum
Forum for the Colemak keyboard layout.
- You are not logged in.
- Topics:
- Active
- Unanswered
Usage of á
- Started by bmx007
- 7 Replies:
Offline
- 0
As a very simple metric, "á" appears in more languages (15) on the Multilingual page than "à" (12). I can't comment on actual frequency though, and it will anyway be very language-specific (and depending on the exact mix of languages you are using).
But one very strong argument is consistency: AltGr+vowel puts an acute accent on all vowels.
Depending on the implementation you're using you could easily change the layout to better match your taste and use though...
Offline
- 0
I understand the consistency argument ,and thanks for the link.
Offline
- 0
In my opinion, the accents part of Colemak is still unfinished. If you want any changes, go ahead and make them for yourself or ask for help here. Myself, I'd use a 102-key board and put the most common accented letter on the VK_102 and some more on the []\ keys at least.
*** Learn Colemak in 2–5 steps with Tarmak! ***
*** Check out my Big Bag of Keyboard Tricks for Win/Linux/TMK... ***
Offline
- 0
The Colemak international was designed based on:
* Similarity to the US-International layout when possible
* Accents that are used frequently worldwide (based on total number of speakers)
* Consistency
áéíóú are used by 3-4 times more speakers compared than àèìòù.
But feel free to create a custom version suited to your needs.
Offline
- 0
I noticed the similarity with the US-International layout, I think it's a good idea. And for my own occasional use of accents in Dutch and French, the current Colemak AltGr layout is sufficient and easy enough to use.
For intensive French users, I think it makes sense to put "à" on altgr+[q] (Azerty's [a]), where "ä" is currently (which I assume you don't need - and which has an alternative input anyway with altgr+[d], [a]).
Offline
- 0
I'm not really an intensive french accent user as I took the habit of not writing them on computer (as much french do). I was more wondering how the design has been made. I think shai answered my question. I m still curious to see the statistics of accents usage, and I think it would be fair to base it not on the number of speakers but on the number of writers ;)
However I guess the consistency make the keyboard easier to learn , so as I am still learning I'll stick with standard accent layout for now, and see when I'll master it if I need to change it.
Offline
- 0
useful, thanks
Offline
- 0