Special Character (Character Map) Problems on WIndows

[gotanidea]

I cannot insert special characters (Character Map) in all Affinity apps on Windows, using the Alt + 0149, Alt + 163, Alt + 169, Alt + 174 and Alt + 176 hotkeys.

I can do it in other applications (Notepad, Notepad++, WPS Office, Libre Office and VectorStyler), except Microsoft Word.

My operating system is Windows 11 Home Single Language 64-bit (10.0, Build 22000).

This is the first time I installed Affinity software on my PC and the version is 2.0.3. I have restarted the PC after the installation is done.

[walt.farrell]

Works fine for me on my Win 11 machine, using Designer (now at 2.0.4) with the Arial font and any of the characters you mentioned:

As with other applications , it does require use of the numeric keypad on my keyboard, and Numlock.

 

 

[gotanidea]

8 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

Works fine for me on my Win 11 machine, using Designer (now at 2.0.4) with the Arial font and any of the characters you mentioned:

As with other applications , it does require use of the numeric keypad on my keyboard, and Numlock.

 

 

It's weird, because I tried it with Arial, Bodoni MT, Book Antiqua and Times New Roman fonts. All those hotkeys I mentioned generated outlined rectangles instead of the correct special characters in all Affinity software

[Gabe]

Can you attach a document with those characters showing as squares? 

[gotanidea]

On 1/31/2023 at 6:56 PM, Gabe said:

Can you attach a document with those characters showing as squares? 

Please find attached for a Publisher file

Special_Characters_Not_Showing_Correctly.afpub

[walt.farrell]

Those are definitely characters that should show as a box:

I'm not sure where the fault lies, but you're not generating the characters you expect. Those Windows key codes (Alt + 0149, etc.) work fine on my Win 11 machine. I can't test on my Win 10 machine as it doesn't have a numeric keypad.

[kenmcd]

The squares are the .notdef glyph (not defined) which is appropriate as U+0013 and U+0011 do not exist in the Arial font.

On 1/26/2023 at 9:24 PM, gotanidea said:

except Microsoft Word.

This is odd, and may be a clue. This should definitely work in Word.

What keyboard layout are you using in Windows?

 

[gotanidea]

4 hours ago, kenmcd said:

The squares are the .notdef glyph (not defined) which is appropriate as U+0013 and U+0011 do not exist in the Arial font.

This is odd, and may be a clue. This should definitely work in Word.

What keyboard layout are you using in Windows?

 

The special characters also appear as outlined boxes with Bodoni MT, Book Antiqua and Times New Roman fonts in all Affinity software on my WIndows 11 system.

As for my keyboard layout, I set the [Time & language] > [Typing] > [Advanced Keyboard Settings] > I tried both [Use Language List] and [English (United States) - US] options

[kenmcd]

32 minutes ago, gotanidea said:

The special characters also appear as outlined boxes with Bodoni MT, Book Antiqua and Times New Roman fonts in all Affinity software on my WIndows 11 system.

This is normal. All of those fonts have the same .notdef glyph.
Bodoni MT and Book Antiqua come with MS Office and have not changed in many years.
The issue is not the fonts.
And the Alt+code has been a part of the Windows operating system for many years.
(those codes are the decimal character codes for the old Windows-1252 encoding)

Something is happening on your system which is interfering with the Windows Alt+code feature which is then inputting the odd codes like above.
Do you have any other app which may be capturing those keystrokes?

 

[gotanidea]

2 hours ago, kenmcd said:

This is normal. All of those fonts have the same .notdef glyph.
Bodoni MT and Book Antiqua come with MS Office and have not changed in many years.
The issue is not the fonts.
And the Alt+code has been a part of the Windows operating system for many years.
(those codes are the decimal character codes for the old Windows-1252 encoding)

Something is happening on your system which is interfering with the Windows Alt+code feature which is then inputting the odd codes like above.
Do you have any other app which may be capturing those keystrokes?

 

I don't think another app was interfering with the Character Map hotkeys, because I can use the hotkeys in other applications, apart from Microsoft Word. I have deactivated Microsoft PowerToys, yet the problem persists

[kenmcd]

2 hours ago, gotanidea said:

I don't think another app was interfering with the Character Map hotkeys, because I can use the hotkeys in other applications, apart from Microsoft Word. I have deactivated Microsoft PowerToys, yet the problem persists

I cannot test the Alt+xxxx in Word as I am on a laptop with no keypad.
But the xxxx (the Unicode code) then Alt+x method works.
Type 2022 then Alt-x and you have a bullet.
This also works in other Windows apps such as LibreOffice, etc.

The only thing which seems to work in APub is entering the Unicode codes.
First type Alt+U to get in the Unicode mode.
Then type U+2022 (Unicode code for a bullet)
Then type Alt+U again and the bullet will appear.

It would be really nice if the Alt+x method worked in Affinity applications as it is more universal.

[walt.farrell]

11 hours ago, kenmcd said:

The only thing which seems to work in APub is entering the Unicode codes.

The standard Windows Alt+nnnn (e.g., Alt+0149) works just fine for me in Publisher, using the numeric keypad with NumLock enabled.

[gotanidea]

19 hours ago, kenmcd said:

I cannot test the Alt+xxxx in Word as I am on a laptop with no keypad.
But the xxxx (the Unicode code) then Alt+x method works.
Type 2022 then Alt-x and you have a bullet.
This also works in other Windows apps such as LibreOffice, etc.

The only thing which seems to work in APub is entering the Unicode codes.
First type Alt+U to get in the Unicode mode.
Then type U+2022 (Unicode code for a bullet)
Then type Alt+U again and the bullet will appear.

It would be really nice if the Alt+x method worked in Affinity applications as it is more universal.

I tried to enable Num Lock as @walt.farrell suggested and I can create the special characters with the hotkeys (Alt + 0XXX keys). Apparently we have to enable Num Lock in Affinity software, which is not necessary in other software

[walt.farrell]

41 minutes ago, gotanidea said:

Apparently we have to enable Num Lock in Affinity software, which is not necessary in other software

It's always been necessary in the software I've used over the years. Without it the numpad doesn't generate numbers.

[johnyM1966]

On 1/26/2023 at 11:24 PM, gotanidea said:

I cannot insert special characters (Character Map) in all Affinity apps on Windows, using the Alt + 0149, Alt + 163, Alt + 169, Alt + 174 and Alt + 176 hotkeys.

I can do it in other applications (Notepad, Notepad++, WPS Office, Libre Office and VectorStyler), except Microsoft Word.

My operating system is Windows 11 Home Single Language 64-bit (10.0, Build 22000).

This is the first time I installed Affinity software on my PC and the version is 2.0.3. I have restarted the PC after the installation is done.

I have same issue, I have "mouse on, registry checked and updated.... 

On 1/26/2023 at 11:24 PM, gotanidea said: