All: Thanks for your help. Now I use the script LC_CTYPE=zh_CN xcin & export XMODIFIERS="@im=xcin-zh_CN" LC_CTYPE=zh_CN.GB2312 $1 & to start my editors. This works, for example, with gvim 6.2.89 OpenOffice 1.1.0 kedit 1.3 The xcin revision, by the wy, is 2.5.3-pre2. Christine: I don't need any further arguments for gvim. Actually this gvim revision doesn't even seem to like the command line options you mentioned in your reply. At least gvim didn't start whenever I tried them. Also, Suse Pro 9.0 by default has the following lines in /etc/xcin/xcinrc: (FONTSET "-sony-*-24-*-iso8859-1,-*-medium-r-*-22-*-gb2312.1980-0,-*-medium- r-*-24-*-gb2312.1980-0") (OVERSPOT_FONTSET "-sony-*-16-*-iso8859-1,-*-medium-r-*-16-*-gb2312.1980-0") Regards, Rolf