I am currently taking my Ancient Buddhist Texts website over into Unicode, and will probably be publishing in that format only by the end of the year. There are certain advantages with the system, although the very unsatisfactory coverage for the characters I am normally using made me resist it for a long while.
As part of the preparation I have written a Unicode Input Programme, which, when active, runs silently in the system tray and allows for the input of Unicode characters through the use of hotkey combinations. The programme is derived from an Auto Hotkey script, an easy scripting language I will write more about later.
I normally use a version of the programme that allows for the input of metrical and various other characters, but this one is meant for the general user, so it has a simplified system, the inputs work with both capitals and simples and the combinations are as follows:
alt + a, i, & u gives macron over a, i & u – (ā, ī, ū)
alt + t, d, n, l, s, & h gives dot under t, d, n, l, s, & h – (ṭ, ḍ, ṇ, ḷ, ṣ, ḥ)
alt + m gives dot over m – (ṁ)
ctr + alt (or right alt) + n gives dot over n – (ṅ)
alt + j gives tilde over n – (ñ)
winkey + s gives acute over s – (ś)
alt + ` & ‘ give double curly opening and closing quotes – (“, ”)
This will work with any Unicode font that has the characters and in any programme that can take text input, including find and replace widgets.
well done, it’s very helpfulbhante!