Re: xkb-data: Help needed for Macintosh keyboards

[Gabriel Paubert <paubert@iram.es>]

On Sun, Sep 24, 2006 at 12:17:09AM +0200, Denis Barbier wrote:
> On Tue, Aug 29, 2006 at 01:26:09PM +0200, Gabriel Paubert wrote:
> > Another point, the es layout for Macintosh is actually 
> > latin american. Apple makes both es and latin american
> > and they are very different: simply look at the differences
> > between latam and es in the symbols directory.
> 
> There is indeed an old bugreport upstream
>   https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1576
> which contains a patch.  Can you please test the attached
> patch?  The "es" layout is renamed into "latam" and keys 1
> and 2 are modified, and a new "es" layout is created for
> Spain.
> 

Well, it works more or less. It does not work as I'd like 
on my old Powerbook since Apple changed the order of the
keys right of the spacebar a few years ago:

- now the keys are: spacebar, Command(Apple), Enter
- on the old one:   spacebar, Enter,          Alt(Option)

I have two (indistinguishable, same ADB keycode) keys 
labeled "Alt" used under MacOS to access third and fourth
level and only one with the Apple logo. Newer keyboards
are the other way around and the Keypad Enter has moved.

I prefer the old layout since I heavily use the 3rd/4th level
(need to type english, spanish and french) combination and map 
the Apple/Command key as Meta (so the mapping is similar to
MacOS). But I shall manage.

Nevertheless, it is an improvement over the old situation 
when most of the 3rd/4th level symbols did not match the 
ones printed on the keys.

I've been unable to match MacOS and have something that works
under emacs: ideally I'd like to use both Alt keys as level3
(option lv3:alt_switch does it, but both Alt keys then set
both Modifiers 1 and 5, and emacs does not allow me to type
3rd/4th symbols).

I'd also like to use both Apple/Command keys as Alt/Meta
(modifier1, not 4), this works under emacs with option
altwin:meta_win but not under other apps that insist
(as I understand it) on checking for Modifier 1. I don't 
understand eiher why the meta_win insists on mapping the 
alt_* keys and giving them modifier 1. There may be a reason 
but it escapes me.

On my old laptop, the Menu key actually exists, it
is Fn+Enter, but not on the new one. This is an easy to
fix kernel bug, but there no menu key on Apple desktop
keyboards (they have 3 keys right of the spacebar, instead
of 4 on PC104/PC105 keyboards).

I know all of this is really confusing, and I may only 
have added to the confusion. Sorry for this, but it's
really confusing to have identically labelled keys which 
have different functions (left and right Alt/Option on 
desktop) while they must have the same function on the
old laptop keyboards (same keycode), while at the same
time having essentially useless keys (the Apple/Option
ones) which are not used by any of the applications
which are important in my daily computer use.

	Regards,
	Gabriel