Russian characters instead of English characters?

Question

So i downloaded these files from Bulgaria. They are the english version of the demo files for a programming tutorial. I noticed that when i try to rename the folders, each keystroke results in Russian(?) characters instead of Latin.

When i open notepad, i get the normal Latin characters. How to fix this?

It also occasionally happens in text editor programs (Notepad++, Visual Studio, Arduino IDE) but the above problem is persistent.

Notes:

I only have English and Japanese language packs installed.
Just recently scanned my Windows installation with the latest Avast (free) virus definition.

Go to `Region and Langauge > Administrative` and tell me what the non-Unicode system locale is set to. Did you check to see that you do not have any Cyrillic keyboards in your input languages list? — oldmud0, May 20 '15 at 00:45
@oldmud0 the system locale (for non-unicode) is set to English — WikiWitz, May 20 '15 at 00:54
What were the files you downloaded: .exe files for each sample, an installer, a downloader..? — oldmud0, May 20 '15 at 01:10
So these are archives of VS projects. You extract them and try to rename the folders in Win Explorer and that's when Bulgarian characters show up? — Karan, May 20 '15 at 02:43
@Karan Exactly! Although im having doubts as to connecting the problem specifically to the archives since this happened before, in other text editing programs. — WikiWitz, May 20 '15 at 02:48
Sounds like a coincidence if it's happened before with other apps as you say. Which version of Windows is this? Even if you have only English and Japanese *display* language packs installed, check if you have a Cyrillic *keyboard layout* or *input method* selected (see screenshots [here](http://superuser.com/questions/581269/windows-8-2-languages-how-to-lock-keyboard-to-only-one) for Win8 to know what I'm talking about). — Karan, May 20 '15 at 02:56

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered May 20 '15 at 03:10

Yes this is a trivial matter but it is annoying and counter productive if you're working on something (and Google can't help).

Figured it out:

Windows 7:
Control Panel > Region and Language > Under "Keyboards and other input languages" click "Change keyboards..." > Advance Key Settings

Under "Hot keys for input languages" i have the key sequence Alt + Shift set for switching between input languages. Although i only have the English input language in the options for the Default input lang. This hot key switches the input lang.

Russian characters instead of English characters?

1 Answers1