"Steven T. Hatton" <hattons@speakeasy.net> writes:
On Friday 20 September 2002 21:14, Mike Fabian wrote:
[...]
I would like to be able to enter such characters without having to browse through picklists, then copy and paste. Having a 'cheat sheet' available would lessen the burden. It may be in intrem solution until a 'correct' solution somes along.
I do use the compose for Á,Ó,Ú,Đ,Þ.Ö, etc. When I looked through the /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/locale/en_US.UTF-8/Compose file I saw that many of the characters requier dead keys. That's what got me talking about the dead '~'.
You can edit the /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/locale/en_US.UTF-8/Compose file to make the characters you need available using <Multi_key> rather than dead keys. For example, if <dead_diaeresis> <o> : "ö" odiaeresis is contained in /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/locale/en_US.UTF-8/Compose, it does not mean that you can't add other entries for other key combinations to write the same character. For example, <Multi_key> <o> <colon> : "ö" odiaeresis coexists without problems in /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/locale/en_US.UTF-8/Compose. I.e. if characters you need frequently have only entries which require dead keys in /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/locale/en_US.UTF-8/Compose, you can add other keycombinations using <Multi_key> to type the same characters if you like. If you do that, keep a backup copy of your edited Compose file in order not to loose it when you update your system.
I guess I don't need the dead key combos for much, righ now. What would be nice is some kind of escape sequence which would allow me to enter <super-escape-key-combo>[unicode hex representation] and out comes the exact character I'm looking for.
That is possible with IIIMF. IIIMF is a new input mechanism, developed by Hideki Hiura and Miyashita Hisashi. I could not yet make it work on SuSE Linux, but I hope that it will work soon. IIIMF uses an extended Compose file which has several sections and one can switch between the sections using special key combinations. There are key combinations which switch to a Unicode hex input mode: <Multi_key> <u> <h> : SWITCH_STATE_TO "[ Unicode Hex ]" Ctrl<T> <u> <h> : SWITCH_STATE_TO "[ Unicode Hex ]"
Another option might be to hijack the number pad for custom key mappings. Have some way of putting the keyboard input mechanism into a special mode where the number pad keystrokes result in
You can also use xmodmap to map the number pad keys to anything you like. For example, if you create a ~/.Xmodmap file containing keysym KP_Enter = EuroSign keysym KP_Add = 0x01006f22 and load it with xmodmap ~/.Xmodmap you can enter the EuroSign by typing KP_Enter and the Unicode character U+6f22 (漢) by typing KP_Add. You can have several such files, ~/.Xmodmap-1 ~/.Xmodmap-2, ... and switch between them using 'xmodmap ~/.Xmodmap-1' etc. ...
In general a more user friendly means of learning the the compose keystrokes would be nice.
Currently you can only read /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/locale/en_US.UTF-8/Compose.
One thing I don't really understand is why not simply have some kind of escape key for dead keys. Or is that what [M ~] really is?
You can achieve the same result with other keys instead of dead keys in /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/locale/en_US.UTF-8/Compose, if that is what you mean. You can use e.g. <Multi_key> or Ctrl<T> like in the above examples. -- Mike Fabian <mfabian@suse.de> http://www.suse.de/~mfabian 睡眠不足はいい仕事の敵だ。