How to insert symbols on a Mac

Often it is necessary for us to use symbols, especially if you tend to do a lot of stuff in the field of Physics and Math. Most people using Windows XP or Windows Vista already know that they can access the character map to insert symbols. On a mac though, things are a bit different and as usual a bit easier too if you know what to do. In fact, depending on the application there are several different ways with which you can insert symbols or even equations if you happen to use Microsoft Word into letters, documents, blog posts, spreadsheets and so on.
As always there are a lot of options that can be used. A couple of them are mentioned below.

Option one: Be patriotic and use the character palette

Note: Using the character palette is the quickest way to insert symbols in any application.

1. Click on the system preferences icon in the dock
2. Click on international
3. Switch to the input menu tab
4. Check the checkbox beside "show input menu in menubar"
Doing so will place a flag that pertains to your region in the top right-hand side of your screen in the menubar.
Once this appears, click on it and then click on show character palette. And from the character palette you can simply choose the symbol you want to copy and then paste it or insert it (make sure the cursor is in the correct place before hitting the insert button) inside the application of your choice. On a mac, you can even search for symbols if you don't know where to find it.

Option two: Use the application itself to insert symbols

If you're working in an application such as Pages or Microsoft Word, it is possible to insert symbol directly from the application itself although I much prefer the first way, especially since I can show of the Canadian Flag on my desktop. Yes I'm Canadian, eh.

Inserting symbols if you're using Pages or any other application created by Apple:

1. Click on Edit in the menubar
2. Click on "Special characters"
3. Use the Characters window in the same way as stated above.

Inserting symbols and Microsoft applications (not recommended):

1. Click on insert in the menubar
2. Click on Symbols
3. This will open Microsoft's Symbol window... which is not as extensive as the one that comes with the operating system. Therefore, it is advisable to use the first option if you tend to use symbols often.

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