Doing accents with characters

Question

I have a problem doing accents, generally I used to press the key letter  just a bit longer and appeared a selection of accent letters, but now it just does repeat the letter like  - eeeee!

Answer 1

Just an informational note

This Terminal command enables the old repeat-key behavior:

defaults write -g ApplePressAndHoldEnabled -bool false

To disable the any-key repetition, use:

defaults write -g ApplePressAndHoldEnabled -bool true

You need to quit and reopen the app for it to react.---------------------------------------------------------------------------

It's unlikely that this setting would revert by itself to the old pre-Yosemite way. Should you want to try it anyway:

• Open the Terminal application and paste the second command at the $ prompt.

Answer 2

This is a convenience provided by the operating system. AFAICT there is no Preference or setting by which to enable/disable it. Although it may not be supported by all programs it certainly should be available in Word 2011, so the most appropriate suggestions are those that usually are the first to be take whenever misbehavior is suspected:

• Verify that your version of OS X & Office are fully updated,
• Restart your Mac

If you still have the problem, try to determine what may have changed on your Mac at about the time the issue arose... New software? Some type of utility used to 'clean up' your Mac? Upgrade to a different version of OS X? Change to a different keyboard?

It's helpful to test in a new Standard User Account to see if you have the same problem when logged in as that user. You might also get some useful advice from the Apple Support Community for your version of OS X.

Answer 3

It should also work with consonants that have accents in European languages, like c, n, l, s, z...

Answer 4

What you are talking about (I think) add characters such ` to say or another letter. Like for Spanish. Mexican Italian.

It only works with certain version of OSX I thin OS X.8 and above.

Basically when yo type a Letter just push down the character and keep the key held down a small menu will appears with the various Accent marks. Best I can it only works with Vowel sounds. AEIOU and possibly Y  does nothing for constants 

 Example touch and hold down the a Character this is what you will see:

This works in any text editing program of any type. Not just Word. When this menu pops up just mouse over to desired accent and click. 

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Answer 5

Try adding a french or spanish keyboard to the list in system prefs/keyboard/input sources and restarting.