Some non-English keyboards contain character keys that are not expected to produce characters by themselves. Instead, they are used to add a diacritic to the character produced by the subsequent keystroke. These keys are called dead keys. The circumflex key on a German keyboard is an example of a dead key. To enter the character consisting of an "o" with a circumflex, a German user would type the circumflex key followed by the "o" key. The window with the keyboard focus would receive the following sequence of messages:
WM_KEYDOWN
WM_DEADCHAR
WM_KEYUP
WM_KEYDOWN
WM_CHAR
WM_KEYUP
TranslateMessage generates the WM_DEADCHAR message when it processes the WM_KEYDOWN message from a dead key. Although the wParam parameter of the WM_DEADCHAR message contains the character code of the diacritic for the dead key, an application typically ignores the message. Instead, it processes the WM_CHAR message generated by the subsequent keystroke. The wParam parameter of the WM_CHAR message contains the character code of the letter with the diacritic. If the subsequent keystroke generates a character that cannot be combined with a diacritic, the system generates two WM_CHAR messages. The wParam parameter of the first contains the character code of the diacritic; the wParam parameter of the second contains the character code of the subsequent character key.
The TranslateMessage function generates the WM_SYSDEADCHAR message when it processes the WM_SYSKEYDOWN message from a system dead key (a dead key that is pressed in combination with the alt key). An application typically ignores the WM_SYSDEADCHAR message.