How to type the plus minus symbol on the keyboard. How to put an exclamation mark on a computer keyboard? Signs and special characters on the keyboard
Sometimes Microsoft Word users need to enter a character that cannot be entered using the keyboard. There are several ways to solve this problem.
First way. Using the "Symbols" subsection to insert a sign
You need to place the cursor at the place in the document where you want to place the sign and open the “Insert” section on the main toolbar.
After going to the “Insert” section, select the “Symbols” subsection and, as shown in the screenshot, go to the “Other Symbols” tab
Next, a new window will appear in front of the user and in the “Font” field in which you need to select the item - (plain text), and in the set field select “additional Latin-1”. One of the last steps is to select the desired plus-minus symbol and insert it into the document.
After inserting, close the window and you can see the selected symbol on the page.
Second way. Using a code value to insert a character
There are two options for inserting a plus-minus sign using a special code.
The first option is to select with the cursor the place where you want to insert the symbol, press the combination “Alt+0177” on the keyboard and after this action the symbol corresponding to this article will appear on the page.
When writing, not only letters are used, but also punctuation marks: period, colon, comma, exclamation point, dash, etc. In addition to punctuation marks, there are special symbols on a laptop keyboard - for example, a hash mark, a dollar sign, and a line for an underscore, which can be made from a dash. In this sense, the laptop keyboard is completely identical to a regular computer keyboard, offering a similar set of punctuation marks.
Signs and special characters on the keyboard
The operation of a laptop keyboard usually does not require the installation of additional software. The only exception is the functioning of “hot keys”, for which it is necessary to install special utilities downloaded from the manufacturer’s website. The remaining buttons, including those that allow you to add a dash or any other punctuation mark, work on the drivers preinstalled in the BIOS.
Depending on the selected layout, some punctuation buttons change their location. You can safely use an exclamation mark, a dash, and an opening and closing parenthesis. Even a simple dash turns into an underscore when you press the Shift key.
Most punctuation marks and special characters should be placed this way by first holding down the Shift button. If, for example, a colon is drawn above the number “6” on the right, then you can put it on the Russian layout by pressing Shift. If the layout is English, then the character that is located on the button on the left will be printed. To help you better understand the difference, here is a table with all the punctuation marks in Cyrillic (Russian) and Latin (English) layouts: 
If you need to insert characters into the text that are not on the keyboard, then use a special table that shows combinations of the Alt key with numeric codes. 
Using such tables (they are different), you can insert almost any symbol, from a note to a paragraph, an emoticon or a heart.
Creating a new layout
If you don't like the way punctuation marks are arranged on your keyboard, and you constantly wonder where the comma is and where the dash is on different layouts before you put the desired character, then change the layout to suit you using the free Microsoft Keyboard Layout Creator program. This will solve the problem with punctuation marks moving across the keyboard. You've probably encountered this situation: in English text you need to insert a comma according to its meaning, but in the Latin layout, when you press a button, a slash is inserted.
Microsoft Keyboard Layout Creator helps eliminate this inconvenience by allowing you to customize your layout. Other users will have to explain how to put punctuation marks, but you won’t have to worry about typing.
- Launch the program. To avoid creating a keyboard layout with all the letters and punctuation marks from scratch, expand the "File" menu and click "Load Existing Keyboard."
- For example, let's edit the Latin keyboard layout. Highlight "USA" and click "OK."
- Give the project a name. Expand the "Project" menu and select "Properties".
- In the “Name” line, specify the name of the project - it will be used as the name of the folder with the configuration files. In the “Description” field, enter a name for the layout. Make it unique so it will appear in the list of Windows keyboards. If you simply write “English”, you will not be able to understand where the normal layout is and where the individual layout is.
- Return to the main program window. Look in the line “Current working directory” where the folder with the configuration files will be saved. You can change the location of the directory by clicking on the dotted button and pointing through Explorer to a different location on the disk.
To assign a new value to a key, left-click on it and in the window that appears, enter a different character or its code. Then you need to check the box next to the “Shift” item and edit the so-called upper values of the buttons on the keyboard. For example, you can split the dash and underscore into different buttons, or split the number “1” and exclamation point into separate keys. 
If you click the “All” button in the character input window, an additional menu will appear in which you can assign key values for combinations with Alt or Alt+Shift. 
It is not recommended to touch the letters to avoid confusion. Place a period, comma, colon in the English layout in the same place where they are on the keyboard in the Russian layout. Don’t forget to bring the Russian layout into line so that there are no errors or overlapping characters.
If you need additional characters that aren't natively on your keyboard, you can easily add them too using the Microsoft Keyboard Layout Creator. For example, let’s add a ruble sign to a button with a dash and underscore.
- Open the Unicode character table. Find the ruble sign. Copy the character itself or its Unicode number.
- Return to the main program window. Click the dash button, then click All.
- Insert the ruble sign into the line “ctrl+alt+key”. Save the new dash configuration by clicking OK.
To add a layout, you need to create an installation package with a setup.exe file that will launch the installer. Expand the "Project" menu and click "Build DLL and Setup Package". The installer will offer to create an operation log (click “No”) and open the folder with the file for installation in Explorer (click “Yes”). 
The layout is ready, all that remains is to install it. Run the setup.exe file and wait for the installation to complete. Then go to the Language and Locale section of Control Panel. On the Languages and Keyboards tab, click Change Keyboard. Click “Add” and find the created layout in the list. Standard layouts can be deleted; they will no longer be needed.
No computer or laptop user can do without alphabetic characters on the keyboard, entered using the appropriate keys. Almost every key has 2 letters - English at the top and Russian at the bottom, i.e. The keyboard has 26 letters of the English alphabet and 33 letters of the Russian alphabet. Moreover, these can be both lowercase and uppercase letters, which are typed using the Shift key.
There are punctuation marks in both English and Russian layouts, although they are located in different places on the keyboard. It is convenient when working with Russian text that a period and a comma are the same key, which is located in the bottom row of the most recent letter keys. Only the comma is typed in combination with the Shift key. And in the English layout, a dot is a key with the Russian letter Y, and a comma is B. So, to enter these punctuation marks, you do not need to switch from one font to another.
We use digital signs or numbers not only for calculations, but also in text to indicate various numerical data. In this case, you can use both the upper numeric row of the keyboard and the additional numeric pad (small numeric keypad) located on the right side of the keyboard.
The basic signs of arithmetic operations (plus “+”, minus “-”, multiplication “*”, division “/”), located on the small numeric keypad by analogy with a familiar calculator, so they are convenient to use when making calculations. But if you just need to print the equal sign “=”, and not find out the result of the calculations, then you will not find such a sign there. It is located in the top number row after the number 0, one key later.
What frequently used characters are on the keyboard?
If you look closely at the keyboard, you can see that many characters are hidden in the number row and on the right side of the letter rows, the last keys. To enter characters instead of letters or numbers when printing, you need to switch to upper case using the Shift key.
If you go in order, starting with the number 1, then in this way when printing Russian texts you enter:
1) exclamation point “!”;
2) opening and closing quotation marks at the beginning and end of the phrase “...”;
3) then, if necessary, the number sign “No”;
4) semicolon “;”;
5) "%";
6) colon “:”;
7) question mark “?”;
8) the asterisk “*”, which is also used as a multiplication sign in computer calculations;
9) round opening “(”;
10) round closing bracket “)” on the key with the number 0;
11) a hyphen and a “-” sign – in the computer version they look the same. The dash character (longer) appears automatically using spaces before and after this character in text programs or is entered using a special code.
12) the = sign and the + sign in upper case, i.e. in combination with the Shift key.
It is noteworthy that the exclamation point, %, *, parentheses are found in both Russian and English keyboard layouts on the same keys.
But some characters exist only in the English layout. For example, square […] and curly (…) brackets, which are located on keys with the Russian letters X (opening) and Ъ (closing), “>” (key with the Russian letter Yu) and less “Rarely used characters on the keyboard
In everyday life, an ordinary user rarely has to use characters that exist only in the English layout: different versions of quotation marks “…”, '…’, `…`, dash “|”, forward “/” and backslash “\” slash, tilde “~ " But the paragraph sign “§” or the degree “°” would be nice , but they are not on the keyboard. You have to enter some characters into the text in a different way.
Every modern user sooner or later faces a task called “typing”. This is an operation that does not require any special skills. Just press the buttons on the keyboard. Sometimes you have to put a variety of signs and symbols in electronic documents. They can be punctuation marks or constants of exact sciences. How to print them? You can find some of the characters on the keyboard. Below we will tell you everything about how to put certain symbols in electronic documents. Let's look at the processes using the example of working in Windows and Word.
Dialing methods
How to put up signs? Only a portion of the special characters are located on the keyboard. And there are usually no problems with their set.
Possible ways to type special characters include:
- use of buttons with corresponding signs;
- working with keyboard shortcuts;
- use of "Unicode";
- use of Alt codes;
- work with the “Copy” and “Paste” keyboard shortcuts.
You can also insert symbols on your computer:
- through working with the "Insert formula" option;
- by inserting from the "Windows Symbol Table";
- using Paste Special in a text editor.
Which option should I use? It all depends on personal preference. Therefore, we will further focus on the most popular methods for solving the problem.
Keypad buttons
On the keyboard, characters are located in different places. Typically, special characters can be found to the right and left of or above the main alphabet. We are talking about buttons with numbers.
When typing characters using keys on the keyboard, either the Russian or English layout is used. For example, to put a period, you can:
- press the button located to the left of the right “Shift” while dialing “Russian”;
- switch to the English layout and click on the letter "Y".
As a rule, keyboard characters typed in this way are limited to slashes, brackets and punctuation symbols. It's not difficult to pick them up.
Keyboard shortcuts
The second method for solving the problem is to work with keyboard shortcuts on the keyboard panel. This arrangement is reminiscent of the previously presented principle.
When using it you need:
- Find a button with a particular symbol on the keyboard.
- Switch the keyboard layout to Russian or English. It depends on what kind of sign you need to put.
- Click on Shift.
- Click on the desired key.
To make it clear what we are talking about, let’s look at an illustrative example. How to type a question mark on the keyboard?
To do this you will need:
- Find the key with the number 7 on the keyboard. It is located above the main alphabet.
- Make sure that the Russian layout is currently activated on the keyboard panel.
- Press "Shift" and the previously mentioned key.
Fast, simple and very convenient. Unfortunately, not all characters can be found on the keyboard. To insert a variety of special characters, Alt codes and Unicode are usually used.
Working with the Copy and Paste commands
Before studying such techniques, it is worth paying attention to one more. We are talking about using the "Copy" and "Paste" options. They can be activated using the keyboard.
To print this or that special character, the user will need:
- Find a ready-made text with the desired sign.
- Select the corresponding symbol. For example, using the "Shift" key and the arrow keys on the keyboard.
- Press Ctrl + C. This option is responsible for copying the symbol to the PC clipboard.
- Place the typing cursor in the desired location.
- Hold down "Control" + M (Russian). This combination is responsible for pasting from the clipboard.
This approach is not very common in practice. To use it, you have to look for ready-made texts with symbols. It's not as simple as it seems.
"Alt" codes
How to put characters on the keyboard? The next solution is to use alt codes. This solution allows you to quickly type special characters on your computer.
Instructions for working with alt codes look like this:
- Activate Num Lock mode on your computer. If the option is active, the corresponding indicator light on the keyboard will light up.
- Place the cursor where the symbol is printed.
- Hold down the "Alt" key. Usually there are two of them on the keyboard. Any will do.
- Type the alt code on the number pad (on the right side of the keyboard). It can be clarified in a special reference book or using the "Windows Symbol Table".
- Release the buttons.
After this, one or another symbol will appear in the text document. Thus, characters are typed on the keyboard very quickly.
To put the infinity sign in Word using the described method, you need to press the Alt key and type the code 8734 on the keyboard. This will lead to printing the symbol ∞. To print a heart ( ) you need to hold down Alt + 3.
Unicode to the rescue
Characters on the keyboard can be printed using Unicode. This is another simple way to type special characters.
To use it, the user will have to:
Find out the "Unicode" of a particular character. You can find it in the "Windows Character Table" or in the "Special Character" section in Word.
- Write the Unicode character where it is printed.
- Press Alt + X.
After these steps, the request will be processed and the inscription will be converted into a symbol.
To understand how to type characters on the keyboard using Unicode, consider an example of printing the % character. To do this you will need:
- Dial code U+0025 (with a plus).
- Press "Alt" + Ch.
About symbol tables
Now let's find out where the paste special is located in Word and the Character Table in Windows. This will help you type characters on your keyboard.
In the first case you will need:
- Open a text editor.
- Click on the tool called "Insert". Here you can find the "Object" section - Microsoft Equation. It is responsible for printing mathematical formulas.
- Click on the "Symbol" button.
- A sign with special symbols will appear on the monitor display. Here you can find any printable character on your computer.
In the second case, you can do this:
- Open "Start".
- Go to the section "All programs" - "Standard".
- Expand the "Service" folder.
- Click on the line labeled "Symbol table...".
If you have a standard large keyboard. Then there should be two buttons on it at once with which you can put a plus sign!
Let's first put and look at our plus sign - this is what our plus sign will look like.
Option number 1: put a plus sign.
Our plus sign is combined on one button with the equal sign! This button is located between the minus and slash buttons.But to put it from here. First you need to put a button and only then press the button with the plus image.