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I wanted to add a latin capital O with circumflex [ô] to a file in emacs, but for some reason all my attempts lead to the character being replaced by a question mark ?. I tried :

  • M-x insert-char LATIN CAPITAL O WITH CIRCUMFLEX
  • M-x insert-char u00D4
  • M-x insert-char U+00D4
  • C-x 8 RET LATIN CAPITAL O WITH CIRUMFLEX
  • C-x 8 RET u00D4
  • C-x 8 RET d4
  • C-x 8 RET U+00D4

I am not sure what the problem is. When I use UNICODE hex instead of its full name the error wrong type argument: characterp nil comes up

Drew
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probo243
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  • First thing to check: do you see the same thing if you start Emacs with `emacs -Q`? If not, bisect your init file to find the culprit. – Drew Jan 31 '21 at 18:43

1 Answers1

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Those mostly work for me in Emacs 27.1, though you should note that correct name is "LATIN CAPITAL LETTER O WITH CIRCUMFLEX". If you don't have autocompletion in this prompt (there is none by default) you do have to get the name exactly correct.

It supports using either the character name or the codepoint number (in hex), but not the u00D4 or U+00D4 forms. If you try the latter then you should get an "Invalid character" error.

If you still can't get it to work, try running emacs -Q. If that works, then the problem is in your Emacs configuration.

db48x
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  • I have completion with `insert-char`: `o with circumflex TAB` gives me 13 completions including the one the OP wants: clicking on it selects it. OTOH, if the OP still gets a `?` after inserting it correctly, then it might be a font problem, I should think. – NickD Jan 31 '21 at 13:58
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    I'd forgotten about fonts, but a missing glyph should result in a square box or a box with 00D4 in it rather than a question mark or a replacement character. – db48x Jan 31 '21 at 14:30
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    I'd say that something in the encoding configuration is wrong, like inserting utf8 in utf-16 or whatever other combination. I'd ask @probo243 to describe coding system and inserted char. – Muihlinn Jan 31 '21 at 15:09
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    [This](https://rufflewind.com/2014-07-20/pasting-unicode-in-emacs-on-windows), although old, supports my suspects, which are that, just a suspect. – Muihlinn Jan 31 '21 at 15:18
  • @dbx48x: yes, you are right - I forgot about the box thingies. – NickD Jan 31 '21 at 20:57