Help

1. I can't see the special characters on the buttons!

  • If you cannot see the characters in the European language keyboards, you're probably using an unsupported browser (see Question 4).
  • If you just cannot see the symbols in the IPA for English keyboard, you probably need to install Lucida Sans Unicode, a Unicode font from Microsoft. Lucida Sans Unicode has a wider range of characters than popular fonts like Arial or Georgia. See Question 2 for instructions.
  • If some of the symbols in the Full IPA keyboard do not display correctly, your best bet is to download and install a free third-party font, for example one of the SIL fonts (Charis SIL, Gentium Plus or Doulos SIL) or perhaps DejaVu Sans. If you use Windows, you might also consider upgrading to Windows 7, which would give you several excellent-looking IPA fonts, most notably Segoe UI and Cambria.

2. How do I install Lucida Sans Unicode on my system?

To install Lucida Sans Unicode on Microsoft Windows:

  1. Download Lucida Sans Unicode from a download link on this page.
  2. Locate the downloaded file (lsansuni.ttf) on your computer.
  3. Open the Control Panel, and then open the Fonts folder.
  4. Copy the file to the Fonts folder (e.g. by dragging it with your mouse).
  5. The font is now installed!

3. I can type the characters on your site, but when I paste them to my document, I get garbage!

Your target document probably uses a font that doesn't have all the necessary characters. Make sure you choose the right font in your document.

For European languages, garden-variety fonts like Arial or Times will do fine; for IPA symbols, you will need a Unicode font such as Lucida Sans Unicode or Segoe UI. Detailed information on recommended fonts is available on the IPA for English and Full IPA pages.

4. The keyboard shortcuts and buttons don't seem to work properly.

Are you using one of the supported browser versions? TypeIt supports the following browsers:

  • On Windows: Mozilla Firefox 3.5 and higher, Internet Explorer 7 and higher. Google Chrome and Safari work except for a few keyboard shortcuts.
  • On OS X: Mozilla Firefox 3.5 and higher, Safari 4 and higher
  • On Linux: Mozilla Firefox 3.5 and higher

If you're using a supported browser version, please report any bugs to me at the e-mail address shown on the About page.

5. A few of the keyboard shortcuts don't work.

If some of the keyboard shortcuts work, but others don't, there are two possibilities:

  1. You are using a browser which is not fully supported, such as Google Chrome or Safari for Windows. Some browsers make it impossible to override their built-in shortcuts, such as Ctrl+N (opens a new window in Chrome) or Ctrl+O (brings up the Open dialog in Safari for Windows). See question 7.
  2. You are using a foreign (non-US) keyboard. Some national keyboards generate different key codes for certain keys like ; or / and TypeIt is unable to recognize them.

As a backup mechanism, TypeIt provides a secondary keyboard shortcut in such cases. For example, when typing Spanish accents, the ¿ character can be typed by pressing either Ctrl+/ or Ctrl+2. You can use the secondary shortcut or just press the ¿ button on the toolbar, whichever you find less awkward.

6. How do I insert the special characters into an HTML page?

First of all, you shouldn't have to convert the characters into HTML entities (e.g. é or —). That is so 1990s! In the 21st century, all you need is a Unicode-capable editor (even the Windows Notepad will do fine):

  1. Open your HTML file.
  2. (optional) If your editor has an option to set the encoding of your file, set it to UTF-8.
  3. Copy your symbols from TypeIt and paste them into your HTML code in the editor. Some characters may appear as squares or question marks — this means that the particular character is missing from the font in your editor. The characters should render fine on the actual page provided that you've specified the proper font-family in your CSS.
  4. When you save your file, choose UTF-8 encoding. (This may not be necessary if you have already set the encoding in step 2.)

  5. Do one of the following:

    • Serve your page with the following HTTP header (you can specify the header in your Web server configuration or in the script which serves your page): Content-type: text/html; charset=utf-8
    • Alternatively, add the following line to the <HEAD> section of your HTML file: <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">

7. Why is there a problem with certain shortcuts on Google Chrome?

Google Chrome makes it impossible to use certain shortcuts in a Web application. For example, Ctrl+N always opens a new window and there is no way to change that behavior. The same goes for Ctrl+W (close window) and Ctrl+T (new tab). As a result, when you try to type ñ in the Spanish keyboard (shortcut: Ctrl+N), you will not only not get the character you wanted; you will also create a new Chrome window, which you will then have to close.

This annoying issue has been reported to the Chrome developers; however, they currently refuse to change the way Chrome works.

If you are bothered by this, you can help bring this problem to their attention: go to the Chromium bug tracker site and star the issue.