Selecting the correct keyboard

For whichever language you have or are using, there should be a flag icon on the right side of the tool bar to indicate your chosen language.

Click on the flag and a drop down list will appear. Click on the chosen language. then click on 'Show keyboard viewer'.

For instance, if you chose British - PC, you would see this as the appropriate keyboard: 

This is the full sized keyboard layout for a desktop PC. Obviously, a laptop keyboard is less contrived.

Hope this helps.

vernhs wrote: Are you aware of any collateral that explains it all; that I might be able to select the keyboard that best suites my needs?

Which keyboard to use depends mainly on what need you have for accented characters. ABC (or US) lets you type English and common W. European languages. ABC Extended lets you type a much wider range of Latin scripts, including transliterated Arabic, Chinese, Hindi, etc. US International PC is really for Windows users who have switched to Mac but gotten used to the US International keyboard on Windows machines to make accented characters needed for common W. European languages.

A guide to the capabilities of ABC and ABC Extended for accents and other special characters can be found at

https://sites.psu.edu/symbolcodes/mac/codemac/

vernhs wrote:

Do you know if there is any reference original documentation that explains all of this?

This page has links to various Apple help references regarding keyboards and languages

https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-13742

vernhs wrote: There are many keyboard layouts that appear to be identical to me:

ABC and US are identical, except US will have an American Flag in the top right corner if you have more than one keyboard active.

ABC Extended is the same as ABC and US, except that it lets you create a lot more accented characters via the Option key.

US International PC is somewhat different, because it uses the keys ' " ~ ` ^ as deadkeys to create accented characters. You have to type a space after the key to get the character on its own.

They will all match the printing on your keyboard.