# How to change from English to Spanish keyboard and Microsoft Office



## AllHeart (Nov 22, 2013)

I found this awesome article by Microsoft on how to change your keyboard from English to Spanish (or any other language). This article may be useful to others on the forum. 

This article is for most versions of Windows - Vista, XP, Windows 7 and Windows 8. 

When you make these changes to your keyboard, this will automatically apply to Microsoft Office. So for example, your spellcheck and grammar will change language.

The article also shows you how to do an "onscreen keyboard" for whatever language you select. You can use this keyboard to type into your document.

This is set up so you just have a little button at the bottom of your screen to toggle back and forth from languages.

I hope this is of help to someone. So without further ado, here is the article:

Enable keyboard layouts for different languages - support - Office.com


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## Alcalaina (Aug 6, 2010)

I used to use that, or something similar, but I don't use Microsoft Office any more.

Alternatively you can buy a Spanish keyboard for about €15. The only character missing from the UK one is a £ sign, and you can get that with Alt 0163.


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## AllHeart (Nov 22, 2013)

Hi Alcalaina. So do you switch from your Spanish keyboard to your English keyboard every time you switch languages? Or is it a bilingual keyboard?


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## NickZ (Jun 26, 2009)

Most people are just going to use one keyboard. There are some things that are easier on an EU keyboard. I'm guessing a Canadian keyboard doesn't have a € key.

If you switch what the OS thinks is your keyboard it's possible to type blind (ignoring the labels on the key) For touch typists this works just fine. But for the hunt and peck types it's better to just get a keyboard that matches the majority of your typing.

English isn't that demanding. So using a non English keyboard may not be a huge problem .


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## Chopera (Apr 22, 2013)

Apart from the pound sign, the UK keyboard is a subset of the Spanish keyboard so you might as well use it all the time, even if you have an English version of Windows..


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## Alcalaina (Aug 6, 2010)

AllHeart said:


> Hi Alcalaina. So do you switch from your Spanish keyboard to your English keyboard every time you switch languages? Or is it a bilingual keyboard?


No, I just use the one keyboard (a Spanish one) for everything. You just have to get used to a few things being in different places. It makes it much easier to do accents, € signs etc everywhere. including emails and FB. The Microsoft solution doesn't always work outside of is own software.


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## Alcalaina (Aug 6, 2010)

NickZ said:


> .... the hunt and peck types ...


Love it! :ranger: :smash:


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## AllHeart (Nov 22, 2013)

NickZ said:


> Most people are just going to use one keyboard. There are some things that are easier on an EU keyboard. I'm guessing a Canadian keyboard doesn't have a € key.
> 
> If you switch what the OS thinks is your keyboard it's possible to type blind (ignoring the labels on the key) For touch typists this works just fine. But for the hunt and peck types it's better to just get a keyboard that matches the majority of your typing.
> 
> English isn't that demanding. So using a non English keyboard may not be a huge problem .


Oh, now I´m looking forward to buying an EU keyboard. Just knowing there's one waiting to being purchased brings out the female shopper in me. 

You're right that my keyboard doesn't have the € symbol.

I've worked as a medical transcriptionist most of my adult life, so I could probably do the English keyboard in my sleep. That's where the onscreen keyboard is most excellent, because I am hunting and pecking on the Spanish keyboard, so I can just click on the onscreen keyboard. Or just use the onscreen keyboard as a reference as to where my Spanish keys are.

Alcalaina is correct in saying changing the Microsoft OS doesn't work for all programs. For example, my Internet Explorer is always in English. So what I do is copy and paste (Ctl C + Ctl V) for just a few characters. (I did that to put the € symbol that you wrote here.)

I'm using the online "Google Translate for Euro Residents" to write in Spanish. I open Word, then translate sentence by sentence from Google Translate, and copy and paste each sentence into Word. Then I copy and paste what I have in Word over to Facebook (or wherever else I want to write in Spanish). 

In case anyone wants to use the Google Translate program, it's really, really easy to use and it's free. It's found here:
SPANISH ENGLISH TRANSLATION


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## AllHeart (Nov 22, 2013)

Oh, my techie nerves are just tingling! I just figured out how to use the Spanish keyboard on Internet Explorer. This also works for Google Chrome and here on the forum. Just use the onscreen keyboard. arty:


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## NickZ (Jun 26, 2009)

AllHeart said:


> Oh, now I´m looking forward to buying an EU keyboard. Just knowing there's one waiting to being purchased brings out the female shopper in me.
> ]


Well if that rocks your world I think virtually every EU country has a slightly different one 

An Italian even has a £


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## gus-lopez (Jan 4, 2010)

We've always used Spanish keyboards but never had one with a € sign ? I have to use 0128.
All have $ signs ??


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## Alcalaina (Aug 6, 2010)

On mine it's the same key as E and you hold down the Alt Gr key.


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## Alcalaina (Aug 6, 2010)

NickZ said:


> An Italian even has a £


Does it have ñ though?

Essential for wishing Spaniards happy birthday!


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## whitenoiz (Sep 18, 2012)

Spanish Keyboards...










For items and symbols highlighted in *Red* use Alt Gr and the appropriate key...

Also see... Spanish Keyboard layout and special alt characters Spain (Spanish) version


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## NickZ (Jun 26, 2009)

Alcalaina said:


> Does it have ñ though?
> 
> Essential for wishing Spaniards happy birthday!


Just ò à è ù

No happy birthdays


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## whitenoiz (Sep 18, 2012)

I have two Spanish keyboards both have the second (Spanish) n / N key, located to the right of the standard UK keyboards L key as in the picture above.. 

ñ is the natural key stroke, Ñ uses the shift key in the same manner as a normal capital letter.


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## AllHeart (Nov 22, 2013)

NickZ said:


> Well if that rocks your world I think virtually every EU country has a slightly different one
> 
> An Italian even has a £


:whoo: Spain, here I come!!! I'm envisioning a closet full of little shelves with all the different EU keyboards, with one keyboard per shelf.


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## AllHeart (Nov 22, 2013)

whitenoiz said:


> Spanish Keyboards...
> 
> 
> 
> ...


That's absolutely awesome! Thank you so much. The red characters don't show up on the onscreen keyboard, but they actually work when I change the OS to Spanish. So I've printed out the info on that link. Thank you.


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## gus-lopez (Jan 4, 2010)

Alcalaina said:


> On mine it's the same key as E and you hold down the Alt Gr key.


Oh dear, I shall have to look harder in future !  I can't believe I've never noticed it before ? Now I've seen it ,it is so noticeable €€€€€€€€€€€€€€ ,it is a lot easier .


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## baldilocks (Mar 7, 2010)

The OP asked about MS Office and in that, you don't need any special keyboards. It is built in:

Use Ctrl with the apostrophe followed by the letter to get the acute accent
Use Ctrl+Shift with the Tilde followed by n the get ñ
Use Ctrl+Shift with the colon followed by the letter to get the diaresis (umlaut)
Use Ctrl+, (comma) followed by the letter to get the cedilla
For use with capital letters just use the Shift key with the letter to get the accent with the capital letter
This doesn't necessarily work with other applications, in which case you can use the Alt + code.


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## AllHeart (Nov 22, 2013)

baldilocks said:


> The OP asked about MS Office and in that, you don't need any special keyboards. It is built in:
> 
> Use Ctrl with the apostrophe followed by the letter to get the acute accent
> Use Ctrl+Shift with the Tilde followed by n the get ñ
> ...


Thank you, Baldilocks. I found an article for Windows and Mac, which includes the info you have above. How to Type Spanish Letters and Accents (á, é, í, ó, ú, ü, ñ, ¿, ¡) | SpanishDict Answers

So that's yet another way to type in Spanish. Or to use a really sick but fitting expression, there's more than one way to skin a cat.


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