Quotes & accents (& Dashes) and TextExpander
Jessica Hische made Quotes & accents (& Dashes). Remembering keystrokes for these characters is hard, but for me remembering character entities is downright impossible. So I made TextExpander do the remembering for me. Here’s how I did it:
- Get TextExpander (obviously)
- (Optional: In TextExpander, create a new group. I call mine ‘Entities’)
- Decide on a trigger key to type before each entity. I use the § as it’s a key I never, ever use for anything else 1
- Set an abbreviation for each entity. Mine are:
| Entity | TextExpander |
|---|---|
| “ Left double quote “ | § option + [ |
| ” Right double quote ” | § option + shift + [ |
| ‘ Left single quote ‘ | § option + ] |
| ’ Right single quote ’ | § option + shift + ] |
| – An en dash – | § option + - |
| — An em dash – | § option + shift + - |
I’ve created TextExpander abbreviations for &, $, ©, …, £ and € too. Now when I need to code a character entity into my HTML, I need only type the trigger key, then the usual keystrokes for that character.
- Why use a trigger key? So I can still use normal keystrokes to insert those characters into other types of documents without TextExpander turning them into entities.
March 6, 2013 • Andy Clarke • development