Windows in English. Most work in French.

My first language is English so I had Windows 7 installed in English. However, a lot of my input is in French (emails, forums, documents etc.). I have added the French keyboard and can switch back and forth using Alt-Shift.

My problem is that every time I open a program such as Thunderbird my keyboard will switch automatically from French to English. I usually type a few lines before looking at my text, which looks like this:

L</cole est ferm/e pour l<an/e.

I always forget to switch keyboards prior to typing text even after 8 months of this.

Is there a way to make French my default keyboard? (I have tried on my own to no avail.)

 

See if this helps: http://www.windowsitpro.com/article...ure-the-default-keyboard-layout-during-login-

I have just changed this on a Windows XP system that all the time switched the IME to Japanese; now it remains on English, as it should be.

 

I drilled down to Keyboard Layout/preload and have 2 values, each in a separate row.
The first is (Default) and under the Data heading it says (value not set).

The next is 1 and the value is 00000409.
It looks like all I need to do is input 00000c0c in place of the 409 setting to make CDN French the default language and that's all. (Or is it? )

The reason I'm double checking is that I have never touched anything directly in the registry.

I think I'll back up the registry (ie. create a system restore point) while waiting for a reply.

 

These references might be helpful: http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/o...language-for-office-programs-HA010356057.aspx

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-vista/Change-the-display-language

 

Click start and open the "control panel" got to "clock,language and region" and on the right of "region and language" you will see "change Keyboards an other input methods" select that and then in the window that opens select "keyboard and languages" then select "change keyboards" this will open another window then select "add" and select the second language you want to use, when this is done you may have to restart and go through the sequence once more until you reach the same window then at the top where mine says "English (united states) Belgian (period)" on the right click the down arrow and it will show both languages, you can then select which one you want to use as default.

Incidentally i work in English and Dutch, mine starts up in Dutch but just the same as you i can switch to English in a flash.

 

This link from the above link did the trick. Thanks!

(Beats me how I missed that when trying to fix this on my own)