A compose key for Windows, written by Sam Hocevar.
A compose key allows to easily write special characters such as é ž à ō û ø ☺ ¤ ∅ « ♯ ⸘ Ⓚ ㊷ ♪ ♬ using short and often very intuitive key combinations. For instance, ö is obtained using o + ", and ♥ is obtained using < + 3.
I wrote WinCompose because I found none of the alternatives (FreeCompose, CKFW, AllChars or Unichars) to be satisfying.
Download latest: WinCompose 0.6.6 (April 28, 2014)
Older versions are available in the releases section.
After installation, WinCompose should appear in the System Tray. Press and release the ⎄ Compose key to initiate a compose sequence (this key defaults to Right Alt); the icon should change to indicate a compose sequence is in progress.
Then type in the keys for a compose sequence, such as A then E for Æ:
If Right Alt is not suitable for you, you can change it in the settings.
Compose rules are supposed to be intuitive. Here are some examples:
- ⎄ Compose ` a → à
- ⎄ Compose ' e → é
- ⎄ Compose ^ i → î
- ⎄ Compose ~ n → ñ
- ⎄ Compose / o → ø
- ⎄ Compose " u → ü
- ⎄ Compose o c → ©
- ⎄ Compose + - → ±
- ⎄ Compose : - → ÷
- ⎄ Compose ( 7 ) → ⑦
- ⎄ Compose C C C P → ☭
- ⎄ Compose < 3 → ♥
The full list of rules can be found by clicking on the WinCompose system tray icon or using the “Show Sequences…” menu entry:
The window allows you to filter the sequences being listed.
WinCompose supports the standard Compose file format. It provides more than
1600 compose rules from the Xorg project and the
dotXCompose project. You can add custom
rules by creating a file named .XCompose or .XCompose.txt in your
%USERPROFILE% directory.
WinCompose supports rules of more than 2 characters such as ⎄ Compose ( 3 ) for ③.
WinCompose supports early exits. For instance, ⎄ Compose & will immediately type & because there is currently no rule starting with &.
As of now, WinCompose is fully translated in two languages: French and Greek. You can help us translate it to more languages using the Weblate project:
WinCompose is known to sometimes misbehave in the following situations:
- When the Synergy keyboard sharing software is running.
- When several keyboard layouts are installed on the computer and they are changed on the fly.
Most of these issues are actually bugs in the AutoHotKey software upon which WinCompose is based.
Please report bugs to Sam Hocevar [email protected] or to the GitHub issue tracker.