Musical flat symbol

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keithm
Posts: 32
Joined: Mon Oct 07, 2019 10:38 am

Musical flat symbol

Post by keithm »

Hello, I am struggling to create a special character for the 'flat' symbol when I want to search for a chord structure.
The symbol dialogue will not let me search for the Unicode 266d or for the Alt code 9837.
I cannot find the flat symbol in any of the special character sets (though I can find the 'sharp' symbol in Misc Characters TNR.
When I hold alt and press the code in a Text Document, the character inserted is an empty rectangle. Similarly for the Unicode.
I have trawled the net and it all seems so simple!
What am I doing wrong?
Windows 10 up to date, Textmaker 2018 up to date.
KeithM
miguel-c
SoftMaker Team
SoftMaker Team
Posts: 1233
Joined: Wed Jun 05, 2019 12:02 pm

Re: Musical flat symbol

Post by miguel-c »

See attached files including the animation.

To insert the flat symbol:
1. change the font to Segoe UI
2. Type 266d and press ctrl+alt+shift+x

After that, you may select the symbol, copy it and paste it into the search box
Attachments
animation2.gif
flat.docx
(11.89 KiB) Downloaded 256 times
keithm
Posts: 32
Joined: Mon Oct 07, 2019 10:38 am

Re: Musical flat symbol

Post by keithm »

Miguel, thanks for your very prompt reply.
After more head scratching, I was able to follow the simple steps you set out, and I finally got a 'flat' symbol on a document.
For dunderheads like me, the key seems to be that before attempting any shortcut, a correct font must be selected, namely a 'UI' font.
Before my first post, I had read the TM2018 manual on this subject, and if I might offer an observation, page 147 might in a future rewrite be clarified. The highlighted note states the fact that 'the font' is not remembered. It might usefully add that for any of the keyboard shortcuts to work properly, a UI font must be selected. That thought might also be added into the paragraphs below on the same page, dealing with other forms of insertion shortcut.
Yours very gratefully, KeithM
miguel-c
SoftMaker Team
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Re: Musical flat symbol

Post by miguel-c »

I made a feature suggestion to the product management so that the software automatically changes to a font that has the symbol.
RKanarek
Posts: 143
Joined: Tue Jan 13, 2004 6:59 am

Re: Musical flat symbol

Post by RKanarek »

Dear miguel-c:

At least for me, your post was very useful. I had no idea of the existence of the feature you described. If anyone else wishes to read about it, it is described in the "Inserting special characters" section of both the TM2018 help file and its instruction manual (pp. 146-147). Thanks again.

As to your idea of having TM pluck symbols from other font files when an otherwise unavailable symbol is requested, I confess that I am less enthusiastic. I take care -- not necessarily good care, but at least some care ;-) -- as to the fonts that are used in my documents. I'm not sure that I'd consider it a desirable feature if TM et al. were to silently insert symbols from other fonts -- fonts that might not be available (to me) in the future or which might be entangled by licenses -- without my approval.


Cordially,
Richard Kanarek
Jossi
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Joined: Fri Dec 05, 2003 10:47 pm
Location: Luebeck, Germany

Re: Musical flat symbol

Post by Jossi »

I fully agree with Richard. That a special symbol is only available when I use a font containing this symbol is basic knowledge from Word processing 101. For me it is essential to have full control over all the fonts used in my documents and I definitely don't want a program to insert glyphs from other fonts without asking me first for permission (just as I generally don't want programs to make changes in documents all by themselves - which can be a pest in MS Word).
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