Fonts and Keyboards
Writing in Diné Bizaad on a computer can be difficult. Few fonts include all of the necessary accents and diacritics, and most keyboards can't even type them.
You can download a Diné Bizaad keyboard layout for Windows or Mac at LanguageGeek. This allows you to repurpose certain keys on your keyboard to type accents when pressed. The page includes instructions for both installation and usage.
Depending on what font you use, some of the accented Unicode characters may not display correctly. Fonts that display all Diné characters correctly include Arial, Candara, Consolas, Courier New, Open Sans, Tahoma, and Times New Roman.
Alternatively, the fonts Times New Roman Navajo, Verdana Navajo, and Century Gothic Navajo display numbers and symbols as Diné accented characters. This allows you to type text that looks like Diné Bizaad without changing your keyboard layout. For example, in these fonts "t1t[ʼid" is displayed as "tátłʼid". You can use the legend below to see which number or symbol produces each letter.
Legend| To get this | Type this |
|---|
| á | 1 |
| ą | 2 |
| ą́ | 3 |
| é | 4 |
| ę | 5 |
| ę́ | 6 |
| í | 7 |
| To get this | Type this |
|---|
| į | 8 |
| į́ | 9 |
| ó | 0 |
| ǫ | - |
| ǫ́ | = |
| ł | [ |
| ń | ] |
| To get this | Type this |
|---|
| Á | ! |
| Ą | @ |
| Ą́ | # |
| É | $ |
| Ę | % |
| Ę́ | ^ |
| Í | & |
| To get this | Type this |
|---|
| Į | * |
| Į́ | ( |
| Ó | ) |
| Ǫ | _ |
| Ǫ́ | + |
| Ł | { |
| Ń | } |
Converter
This tool lets you convert between plain text, the Navajo font, and Unicode. Enter your text into either of the top two text boxes according to the legend above; the bottom box will have the same text, but converted to Unicode symbols.
Put a backslash (\) before any character that you don't want to convert. For example, if you don't want to display the number "10" as "áó", write it as "\1\0".
Plain numbers and symbols here...
...look like this in the Navajo font...