The X server does keyboard mapping of keys and you can use X to map keys. If you have an international keyboard set up then X ships with compose functionality which for the subset of symbols it does is usually easier to learn. Basically hit alt (left alt to US folks) and shift together, then let go of both, now type two keys in sequence that compose the resulting symbol. The compose pairs are designed to be logical thus ss = ß a' = á e^ = ê e= = € c, = ç and so on Alan
