Re: Backspace & Delete

[Kent West <westk@acu.edu>]

Brad wrote:
> 
> On Sun, Nov 21, 1999 at 03:59:35PM -0600, Kent West wrote:
> > I'm a bit confused.
> >
> > If I have an .xinitrc file in my home directory when I fire up X, my
> > delete key works like a backspace in xterm. If I don't have an .xinitrc
> > file, it works properly (deleting chars to the right of the cursor). In
> > either case, it works properly when composing this message in Netscape
> > Mail, and it works properly in nedit, so it seems to only be a problem
> > in xterm. Rxvt also works properly.
> >
> > My .xinitrc is simply:
> >
> > xterm -geometry +2+2 &
> > icewm
> >
> > My .Xsession is identical. I don't have any files referring to modmap in
> > my home directory, and the /etc/X11/Xmodmap is completely commented out.
> >
> > My sister is logged into X on display :0 via xdm, but I manually start
> > my session via "startx -- :1". Her xterm works properly; she does not
> > have an .xinitrc in her home directory, or any other file that looks
> > like it might have to do with keyboard mapping.
> >
> > I don't really understand all the ins-and-outs, but I originally
> > suspected that having an .xinitrc in my home dir caused /etc/X11/Xmodmap
> > to get "skipped", but since that file is completely commented out, and
> > since the problem only seems to affect xterm, I'm now thinking that's
> > not the problem.
> >
> > I suspect I could add
> >       keycode 22 = BackSpace
> >       keycode 107 = Delete
> > to my .xinitrc file (I'm not sure about this), but that doesn't explain
> > why having a .xinitrc file changes the default behaviour of the delete
> > key.
> 
> If i had to guess, i'd think the problem is that your xinitrc doesn't
> allow for the sourcing of the various Xresources, one of which appears
> to have settings for xterm keybindings. i'd suggest you forgo an
> .xinitrc file and just use .xsession.
> 
> The way the process seems to work (i could be wrong), startx first
> executes .xinitrc if it exists, /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc otherwise. All
> the default /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc does is call Xsession (as used by
> xdm), which adds in the Xresources and then hands off control to your
> .xsession, or launches a window manager if that file doesn't exist. Your
> xinitrc doesn't do this, so it bypasses the sourcing of all the
> Xresources.
> 
> You can simply "mv .xinitrc .xsession" and it should work fine, no
> changes.
> 
> --
>   finger for GPG public key.
>   16 Nov 1999 - new key generated, please stop using the old.
> 
>   ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>    Part 1.2Type: application/pgp-signature

Whoo-hoo! That did it! Thanks, Brad! (I love this list!)