Konsole and SCIM were actually working for a while, and now since a recent update there has been a degradation: Now when I use SCIM to enter Chinese characters into konsole, some of the characters appear as they should, and some just show up as square boxes. $ apt-show-versions | grep konsole konsole/testing uptodate 4:3.5.8.dfsg.1-2 Note that SCIM continues to work with other applications like claws-mail: 你好吗?