I can't seem to input the syntax for an umlaut.
Here is what I write
\documentclass[12pt]{article} \setlength\parindent{0pt} \usepackage{amsmath} \numberwithin{equation}{section} \usepackage{color} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage[margin=2.0cm]{geometry} \usepackage{graphicx} \usepackage{float} \usepackage{array} \usepackage{url} \usepackage{braket} \usepackage{hyperref} \usepackage{tensor} \usepackage{titlesec} \usepackage{amsthm} \begin{document} {\''o} \end{document} Now when I copy and paste {\''o} from the internet it works fine and I get the first thing, but if I type it in manually then I get the second. Texworks automatically changes my ' to a \rq{}, so I have to do ctrl+shift+' or alt+' to get the character -- I think that this will have something to do with it but I don't know what.

\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}to your preamble