Windows CE and the Euro (�) Symbol

CESD-S-0003

Applies To:

Windows CE 1.0, 1.01
Windows CE 2.0, SP1
Windows CE for Handheld PC Professional
Widows CE for HPC2000

Overview:

This article discusses support for the Euro Dollar symbol on Windows CE Handheld PC devices.

What is the Euro?

"The day is almost upon us. On the 1st January 2002 after years of planning the Euro Dollar or Euro will become the official, and the only currencies of the collective of countries know as the EuroZone members." - 25th October 2001

The Euro, or Euro Dollar is the new standardised currency of 11 of the European Unions Member states. Not all member states chose to join the Single European Currency on January 1st 2002, such as the United Kingdom (England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland), Denmark, Finland, Greece and Sweden.

These member states haven't decided to join the Single Currency for Economic or Social / Political reasons. In all likelihood these country's will eventually join within the next decade.

Who are the 11 members of the EuroZone?

Austria
Belgium
Finland
France
Germany
Italy
Luxembourg
Netherlands
Portugal
Republic of Ireland
Spain

The 15 member states of the European Union when this article was originally released has now increased to 25 members. Many of these new members will also eventually opt for membership in the Single European Currency.

What does Microsoft say on the topic?

"Version 2.1 and beyond of the Windows CE operating system support the euro currency symbol". In other words, just what Windows CE 1.0, 1.01 and 2.0 users wanted to hear.

Microsoft realised that they would have a problem and with the Palm-Size PC release of Windows CE 2.1 in July 1998 promptly added support. Granted this release was for the Palm PC, however all future incarnations of the Windows CE Operating System were given Euro Support.

Windows CE based devices running Windows CE 2.11 / 2.12 (Handheld PC Professional), Windows CE 3.0 (Handheld PC 2000) and Windows CE 4.x .net are fully Euro Compliant.

Microsoft created patches and updates for all of their desktop Operating Systems, right back to the 1993 released Windows 3.1x. However they have not, and have no plans to release a patch or add-on for Windows CE 1.0x or 2.0.

Courier New and the Euro © HPC:Factor This image shows the Character Map for Windows CE 2.0's Courier New font compared to a Euro enabled version of Courier New (version 2.80) in this example from Microsoft Windows Millennium.

In it you can clearly see the absence of the Euro Symbol, as well as 2 other updated characters and glyphs in the type set of the Euro enabled version.

The Euro Dollar Character is found in the standard International / British English character set Hex 0128 or Unicode 20AC.

On a patched Host system it can also be obtained by pressing Ctrl + Alt + E on a International English keyboard or Ctrl + Alt + 4 on a English British Keyboard.
Character placement on Handheld PC device can depend on the OEM and any customisations that they have made in their implementation of the Intentional Standardised Keyboard layout for any specific region. Usually the Euro symbol will be found using either of the above key combinations or by pressing the Special Function (FN) key and 4 (FN + 4).

Note for hp 300 series users: hp made a fatal decision when they made the master build of the ROM modules. They didn't include support for entering HEX values on the numeric keypad. This was corrected in the 620LX ROM.

What else will I need to make use of the Euro Symbol?

You will Need to make sure that your Host PC's Operating Systems is Euro enabled.
For more information see the HPC Factor Patching Section

Microsoft Outlook 98 or above. Microsoft Outlook 97 does not support the Euro Symbol.

Microsoft ActiveSync 3.0 and above for fully patched Euro support.

NB: Windows CE 1 will not synchronise with Microsoft ActiveSync and so there is no Euro enabled Host software for it.