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In any program I type á pressing the ´ + a (in sequence). When I do it in emacs I only get a. The dead key only acts when I type an space. For example, if I type:

´ + a + SPC

I get:

when I expect:


Any ideas on why this may be happening? It only happens with emacs.

(This happens with an empty .emacs.)

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Try pressing C-x 8 ' a. This is a way to enter a dead key no matter how the system is configured.

Many systems are configured in that way that they do not support dead keys. My X server uses the nodeadkeys XkbVariant. I do this because I enter more ofter a circumflex for an regular expression than for an French letter. On such a system C-x 8 can be used to get still a dead key.

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I don't know what changed on my system, but I don't have any further my original problem and I can't check your solution. If you explain why your combination should make any difference I'll happily upvote and approve it. –  Joaquin Cuenca Abela May 5 '11 at 16:36
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