[Cin] Help: clarify some points of the manual

Georgy Salnikov sge at nmr.nioch.nsc.ru
Wed Sep 30 06:49:42 CEST 2020


> On Tue, 29 Sep 2020, Phyllis Smith via Cin wrote:
>
> > A program called "xev" that you can type at the prompt on a window which
> > brings up a square box but if you move the mouse to that little window and
> > type a character, it shows you what the key name is.  For left alt, it is
> > Alt_L but right alt has no name.  Another anomaly is the left ctrl key
> > which is Ctrl_L and the right ctrl key which is Ctrl_R.

Another collegue has tested right Alt on his computer, and it did also work.
He has Opensuse and XFCE desktop (he also hates KDE).

> Just now I have checked the same behavior on my computer at work with xev:
>
> Left Ctrl is called Control_L, keycode 37, keysym 0xffe3
> Right Ctrl is called Control_R, keycode 105, keysym 0xffe4
> Left Alt is called Alt_L, keycode 64, keysym 0xffe9
> Right Alt is called Alt_R, keycode 108, keysym 0xffea
>
> So, the right Alt key is active, an application can use it just as it uses
> left Alt.
>
> Which key has which name, and whether an X11 application is given chance to
> see it at all, depends on the Xorg server configuration: XkbLayout,
> XkbVariant, XkbOptions etc.
>
> After that, keystrokes may be catched by the window manager and, may be,
> some special key interceptors like, for example, language switchers in
> multilingual keyboard configurations, or accessibility tools emulating, for
> example, mouse motion via some combination of keys.
>
> For example, I have the following configs:
>
> X.Org X Server 1.9.5
> Option "XkbLayout" "us+ru3"
> Option "XkbOptions" "terminate:ctrl_alt_bksp,grp:shifts_toggle,grp_led:scroll"
> Window manager fvwm-2.6.1 (neither KDE nor GNOME)
> Keyboard language switcher xxkb
>
> The xxkb switcher uses a rather exotic key combination Shift_L+Shift_R
>
> The window manager uses several key bindings:
>
> Menu - to set keyboard focus to a selected window
> Alt/Shift/Left (Right, Up, Down) to move cursor discretely without mouse
>
> Of course I cannot use the same combinations in any application. Should I
> wish to use Alt/Shift/Left in Cinelerra, for example, then I have firstly to
> remove the corresponding definitions from my fvwm configfile.
_______________________________________________________________________________

Georgy Salnikov
NMR Group
Novosibirsk Institute of Organic Chemistry
Lavrentjeva, 9, 630090 Novosibirsk, Russia
Phone   +7-383-3307864
Email   sge at nmr.nioch.nsc.ru
_______________________________________________________________________________



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