I'm considering buying a mechanical keyboard but the choice is somewhat limited by the language layout; many keyboards come only in US/UK with some (like the Das Keyboard I want) adding DE and NO only. My language is Portuguese (pt) so I'll need ç ª º ~ and some others. The question is can I add symbols to a combination of keys using software? Something like: shift and 1 would type ç shift and 2 would type ª etc. This would be in both Windows and Linux. Thanks in advance.
Many keyboards let you program/reprogram keys for special or "foreign" characters. And Windows will too. I am not sure about Linux but I would be surprised if you cannot.
I found WinCompose through Martin Brinkmann's page and find it very useful with an EN-US keyboard: http://www.ghacks.net/2014/12/29/wincompose-use-keyboard-shortcuts-to-write-special-characters/ Direct link on Github: https://github.com/samhocevar/wincompose
Thanks for your answers. I went through several forums and some personal testing and found not exactly what I want. Not a huge problem though, I'll just have to compromise.
I keep a shortcut to this handy so I can easily remember how to make Ω, °, £, ± and other symbols as needed.