I wonder more and more whether the keyboard cripple disease (KCD) is mostly an American affair, but it's more likely something that potentially affects any translator who lives in a non-native country. The typical preconditions are that he or she purchased a computer in the country where he or she learned to type (more effectively) and now uses it to translate into his or her native language. The symptoms are an enormous waste of time finding and using so-called "shortcuts" to enter special characters of the native target language. These "shortcuts" are in fact completely imaginary and can lead to serious psychoses if the patient discovers how many hours, days, and weeks he or she has wasted entering four-digit codes for one character, employing extreme finger gymnastics to reach humanly impossible key combinations, and/or finding himself or herself completely stranded on computers or applications that are not the familiar and the preferred.

(Maybe I should add medical translation to my repertoire of translation expertise!)

Really, there is hardly anything that gets me more enraged than the way many of us cripple ourselves with keyboards. In my opinion, there are three things that we need to be able to do as we enter text (and this does not include CJK translators):

1. There should not be more than one keyboard stroke per entered character.
2. Whatever method we use has to work identically in all applications.
3. Whatever method we use needs to be able to be replicated on any other standard computer without installing third-party applications.

All these criteria sound like no-brainers to me, since they afford portability between apps and computers as well as ease of work. But it's far from the reality for many of us. Let's look at all the crazy methods we use (I use a classification that you can find in a slightly altered way in my book):

• The archaic way: The Character Map. You can either start this under Start> (All) Programs> Accessories> System Tools> Character Map, or through a slightly modified version within Word or many other programs from within an application. Here you can find all the supported symbols and characters for each individual font to select and paste into your text. This is a great choice for the very casual foreign language user, but certainly not for the professional translator -- and I admit that there are probably very few professional translators who work that way.
• The Word-centric way: MS Word provides a number of keyboard shortcuts to enter special characters, such as CTRL+SHIFT+@ followed by a for å. You can find a full list of these on Microsoft's website or in your Word help system. Sounds great at first, but you still need two keys to get to your special characters and, even worse, once you leave Word you're lost. (The other Word-centric way, where you customize shortcuts within Word, is even worse because you're not only lost outside of Word, but also on any computer other than your own since these customized shortcuts are stored on your computer only.)
• The macro way: There are many programs that allow you to automate other many-step-processes into one keyboard shortcut. A well-known example for special-character purposes is the oddly named AllChars, which provides a large number of preconfigured keyboard shortcuts for special characters (that all follow the pattern Ctrl [release!] + one key + second key) and also allows you to enter more individual ones. I probably don't have to explain why this is not a good way to go about doing things in your main language (number of keyboard strokes, being lost without it), but still this is a good program when you have to write short texts in a third or fourth language.
• The programmer's way: There are many programs out there that allow you to reprogram any (virtual) keyboard that Windows offers you in the standard installation. These are so-called mapping programs, with the most well-known probably being the Microsoft Keyboard Layout Creator or MSKLC, a tool that Microsoft supplies for free. It works great, though it's a little complicated, and it allows you to put all kinds of fancy new key assignments on your keyboard. This allows you to take an existing language-specific keyboard, change some settings, and save that new keyboard as a customized keyboard for your language. Or you can create a new keyboard from scratch. What's wrong with it? Your fingers will wreak havoc with you once you leave your computer.
• The work-out way, aka the ANSI code: This poor but unbelievably popular way among translators consists or four (4!) keystrokes for one character. To activate this, make sure that you have your NUM LOCK key enabled (the small keypad on the right of your keyboard), and type the number of that character on the small keypad as you press the ALT key. The above-mentioned å has the key combination 0228. Phew! This is a great way to train your memory to remember all kinds of code and exercise your finger muscles, but certainly not conducive to a productive work environment!

So, lots of bad ways to go about entering text -- what are the good ways? (I very consciously do not even mention speech recognition, which in many ways might be superior to any keyboard-based entering of text.)

In my opinion there are only two viable options, of which the most relevant is the installation of the correct keyboard for the respective target language.

Most of you know that Windows supports a large number of virtual keyboards (which have no relationship to the printed letters on your physical keyboard) that are very easy to install. Select

• Start> Settings> Control Panel> Keyboard> Language (Windows 9x)
• Start> Settings> Control Panel> Input Locales> Change (Windows 2000)
• Start> Control Panel> Regional and Language Options> Languages> Details (Windows XP)
• Start> Control Panel> Regional and Language Options> Keyboards and Languages> Change keyboards (Windows Vista -- for Vista and XP this follows the Classic View in the Control Panel)

and once you are at the dialog to install additional keyboards, select Add and define which additional languages and/or keyboards you would like to have installed on your system. Once you select OK, the new keyboard will show up in the list of installed keyboards.

After you leave this dialog, you will have a little language icon displayed on your task bar which displays your currently selected languages and allows you to switch between the different keyboards.

This is all quite easy. The difficult thing now is learning the new layout of the new keyboard. It might be difficult to find an actual physical keyboard for that language in your location -- but that can be also a real advantage because then you won't rely on watching your fingers as you type or be hampered once you don't have access to your special keyboard.

As a training aid, it might be quite helpful to have the On-Screen Keyboard of your current keyboard displayed. You can launch that (only in XP and Vista) under Start> Programs> Accessories> Accessibility> On-Screen Keyboard (Vista: Start> Programs> Accessories> Ease of Access> On-Screen Keyboard.)

And if you complain about the time it takes you to retrain your fingers, think of the many hours that you will save in the long run.

Oh, I mentioned that there are two good keyboard options. The other is probably the US-International keyboard, which is relevant for anyone who is determined to have the English keyboard be the main staple and at the same time access a good number of important international characters by pressing the right ALT key (RightAlt + w makes å).