Editing Help:Special characters (section)

== Viewing ==
Most current browsers have some level of Unicode support, but some do it better than others. The most commonly encountered problem is that browsers running on Windows XP rely on preconfigured font links in the registry rather than actually searching for a font that can display the character in question. This means that the browser often had to be forced to use particular fonts. On the English Wikipedia, there are a set of templates to do this. For example, {{tl|IPA}} for the [[w:International Phonetic Alphabet|International Phonetic Alphabet]]. The stuff in [[w:Windows Glyph List 4|Windows Glyph List 4]] should be safe to use without such special measures.

=== Windows 7 ===
Unicode support is extended through installing the optional standalone Windows Update package KB2729094,<ref>{{cite web|title=An update for the Segoe UI symbol font in Windows 7 and in Windows Server 2008 R2 is available (KB2729094)|url=http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2729094|website=Windows Knowledge Base|publisher=[[Microsoft Corporation]]|accessdate=29 October 2014}}</ref> available for both '''[http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=30521 32-bit]''' and '''[http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=30566 64-bit]''' versions of [[Windows 7 SP1]] from the Microsoft Download Center. This [[backport]] from Windows 8 updates the [[Segoe#Segoe_UI|Segoe UI]] font by adding browser support for [[Emoji]] and other symbols to Windows 7. More Emoji characters can be installed by copying the Segoe UI Emoji font file, seguiemj.ttf, from another computer running Windows 8 or later, into the Windows 7 computer. Newer Windows versions provide more emoji characters than older versions.

=== Displaying special characters ===
To display Unicode or special characters on web page(s), one or more of the [[List of typefaces#Unicode fonts|Unicode fonts]] need to be present or installed in your computer, first. For proper working functionality, ''setup'' or ''configuration'' or ''settings'' from the web page viewing browser software also needs to be modified.

Special symbols should display properly without further configuration with [[Konqueror]], [[Opera (Internet suite)|Opera]], [[Safari (web browser)|Safari]], and most other recent browsers. An optional step that can be taken for better (and correct) display of characters with [[Ligature (typography)|ligature]] forms, [[Combining character|combined characters]], after the previously mentioned steps were followed, is to install a [[Unicode#Multilingual text-rendering engines|rendering engine]] software.

For displaying individual special characters, HTML decimal or [[hexadecimal]] numeric entity codes can be used in the place of the ''char''. If a paragraph with lots of special Unicode characters needs to be displayed, then, <code>&lt;p class="Unicode"></code> ... <code>&lt;/p&gt;</code>, or, <code>&lt;span class="Unicode"&gt;</code> ... <code>&lt;/span&gt;</code> can also be used.

The <code>class="Unicode"</code> is to be used in web page(s), HTML or wiki tags, where various characters from wide range of various Unicode blocks need to be displayed. If the special characters that need to be displayed on web page(s) are mostly covering fewer Unicode blocks, related to [[Unicode Latin|Latin scripts]], then <code>class="latinx"</code> can be used. For special characters or symbols related to [[International Phonetic Alphabet]], <code>class="IPA"</code> can be used. For [[Polytonic orthography|polytonic (Greek)]] characters or related symbols, <code>class="polytonic"</code> can be used.

=== Choosing a font ===
Some freely available fonts that include many [[Unicode blocks]] are [[TITUS Cyberbit Basic]] and [[GNU Unifont]]. The [[Unicode font]] article provides a more general overview through [[Unicode_font#List_of_Unicode_fonts|this table]]. If you already know what specific blocks are needed, [[Unicode_font#Comparison_of_fonts|this section]] may be more useful. Most articles on specific scripts include information on the corresponding Unicode block.

{{A note}} Many websites (including Wikimedia sites) default to serif or sans-serif fonts depending upon the page element (e.g. headings may default to serif, and body text to sans serif) so it may be necessary to use [[Help:CSS|custom CSS styling]] if you wish to override this and force a certain font.

=== Changing Google Chrome's default font ===
[[Google Chrome]] allows the user to set default fonts for normal, serif, sans-serif and monospace display modes. Any font that is currently installed on the system may be used. To access this setting, click the three-dot options icon on the top right of the browser window and select '''Settings'''. Scroll to the '''Appearance''' section, and click '''Customize fonts'''. Here, you can select any fonts on your system to use as defaults.

=== Changing Mozilla Firefox's default font ===
In [[Mozilla Firefox]], to change the font, you need to open the '''Settings''' window though the '''Tools''' menu or the menu button. In the '''General''' panel, scroll to '''Fonts and Colors''' and choose an appropriate font. Usually, any font installed on your system should be available. You may also click '''Advanced''' to disable custom fonts and choose different fonts for proportional, serif, sans-serif and monospace, but this doesn't seem to be always required.

=== Changing Internet Explorer's (IE) default font ===
The default font for Latin scripts in older versions of the [[Internet Explorer]] (IE) web browser for Windows is [[Times New Roman]]. Older editions of the font don't include many [[Unicode block]]s. To choose a different font, follow this path from the IE menu bar ''':''' &nbsp;{{nowrap|Tools &gt; Internet Options &gt; (General tab &gt;) Fonts &gt; Webpage Font:}}<br>
to a scrolling list of fonts and select a different one, such as [[Lucida Sans Unicode]], and then select '''OK'''.