Free Download for Easier Typing German on a US or UK Keyboard
 

NEW VERSION (1.4)

Type Easily in German
Here’s a neat little program for Windows PC users that makes it much easier to type German characters on a U.S. or U.K. keyboard. We can offer it to you free — thanks to a nice reader who contacted me with the following offer:

I am in week one of attempting to learn German. I was immediately frustrated by the inconvenience of typing key codes or using the international U.S. keyboard. Since I'm a software engineer I decided to create a new German-specific keymap for Windows Vista/XP.

How it works is simple...

Right-Alt +...
a = ä
A = Ä
o = ö
O = Ö
u = ü
U = Ü
e = é
s = ß
$ (or 4) = €
< (or ,) = «
> (or .) = »
(The last three are available with or without holding shift simply for ease of typing.)

The above was as intuitive as I could come up with. Since I am still learning German, what seems intuitive to me may not be intuitive to someone who is well versed. Since none of the above key combinations do anything in the normal U.S. keyboard, there is no conflict or re-learning needed.

- Paul Harker
 

Free Download
Thanks to Paul, we can offer this helpful program to you as a free download. He has now provided his latest revision (Version 1.4) with a few more improvements (August 2008), even adding a new version for French keyboards. See the information and download links below.

DeKey (Ver. 1.4) now comes in four different formats for various keyboards: (1) US, (2) UK, (3) French, (4) US Dvorak. You can choose to download only the format you need (Separate Formats) or all four formats in a single ZIP file (All Formats). If you are updating from any previous version of DeKey, you must first uninstall the older version. (See the Uninstall instructions in the ZIP file you download after unzipping.)

Download DeKey:

MORE > DeKey Download: All formats
   (US, UK, French, US Dvorak in one ZIP file)

MORE > DeKey Download: Separate formats
   (individual ZIP files for each format)

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