compose key not working

QNX Newsgroups (Archives) qdn.public.qnx4.photon
1

Hi all,

What could be the cause that the compose key is not working. We need
this to work for our international customers.
I attached a 104-key keyboard to the qnx system at the PS/2 port and
tried in a pterm the key sequences as indicated in the helpfile. Yet no
sucess :frowning:
Below I added some information collected at the system.
Maybe someone could tell me where to look, hardware, software or
configuration, in order to solve this problem.

Thanks for your time,
Pim

$ env
TERM=qansi-m
PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin:/qnx4/photon/bin
SYSNAME=qnx4
TZ=MET-01MEST-02,M3.5.0/2,M10.5.0/2
HOSTNAME=Mnode10
NETMASK=255.255.0.0
GATEWAY=10.1.1.1
JED_ROOT=/usr/local/jed
PHOTON=//1/dev/photon
PHOTON_PATH=/qnx4/photon
PHFONT=/dev/phfont
KBD=en_US_101.kbd
ABLANG=en_US
ABLPATH=/qnx4/photon/translations
PHEXIT_DISABLE=phshutdown
PHWMEXIT=1
PHINSTANCE=1
HOME=/home/vimec
LOGNAME=vimec
SHELL=/bin/sh
PHIG=2
$ sin ver
PROGRAM NAME VERSION DATE
sys/Proc32 Proc 4.25J Sep 09 1999
sys/Proc32 Slib16 4.23G Oct 04 1996
sys/Slib32 Slib32 4.24B Aug 12 1997
/bin/Fsys Fsys32 4.24T Feb 26 1999
/bin/Fsys IDE 4.24B Jun 09 1998
//1/bin/Dev32 Dev32 4.23G Oct 04 1996
//1/bin/Dev32.ansi Dev32.ansi 4.23H Nov 21 1996
//1/bin/Dev32.ser Dev32.ser 4.23I Jun 27 1997
//1/bin/Dev32.par Dev32.par 4.23G Oct 04 1996
//1/bin/Dev32.pty Dev32.pty 4.23G Oct 04 1996
//1/bin/Pipe Pipe 4.23A Feb 26 1996
//1/bin/Net Net 4.25C Aug 30 1999
//1/bin/Net.tulip Net.tulip 4.25Q Aug 30 1999
//1/bin/Net.tulip Net.tulip 4.25Q Aug 30 1999
//1/usr/bin/Socklet Socklet 4.25G Dec 08 1998
//1//photon/bin/Photon Photon 1.13D Sep 03 1998
//1//bin/phfontpfr Photon Font 1.13A Jul 07 1998
$ ls -l /usr
total 49
drwxrwxr-x 2 root root 4096 Mar 08 2000 bin
drwxrwxr-x 4 root root 4096 Mar 08 2000 lib
drwxrwxr-x 4 root root 4096 May 03 2001 local
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 12 Mar 28 15:03 photon →
/qnx4/photon
drwxrwxr-x 2 root root 4096 Mar 08 2000 spool
drwxrwxr-x 3 root root 4096 Mar 08 2000 spool
drwxrwxrwx 2 root root 4096 Feb 21 16:36 ucb
$ ls -l /usr/photon/keyboard
total 760
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3295 Jun 15 1999 CapsLockFull.inc
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3186 Jun 15 1999 ShiftLockFull.inc
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 5239 Jun 15 1999 altgr.inc
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3370 Jun 15 1999 common.inc
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 26205 Jun 15 1999 compose.inc
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3433 Jun 15 1999 da_DK_102.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3138 Jun 15 1999 da_DK_102.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3582 Jun 15 1999 de_CH_102.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3362 Jun 15 1999 de_CH_102.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3348 Jun 15 1999 de_DE_102.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3267 Jun 15 1999 de_DE_102.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 2826 Jun 15 1999 en_CA_101.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 2938 Jun 15 1999 en_CA_101.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 2881 Jun 15 1999 en_GB_102.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3019 Jun 15 1999 en_GB_102.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 2826 Jun 15 1999 en_US_101.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 2938 Jun 15 1999 en_US_101.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3322 Jun 15 1999 es_ES_102.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3154 Jun 15 1999 es_ES_102.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3515 Jun 15 1999 fr_BE_102.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3218 Jun 15 1999 fr_BE_102.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3365 Jun 15 1999 fr_CA_102.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3608 Jun 15 1999 fr_CA_102.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3582 Jun 15 1999 fr_CH_102.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3362 Jun 15 1999 fr_CH_102.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3158 Jun 15 1999 fr_FR_102.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3177 Jun 15 1999 fr_FR_102.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 2773 Jun 15 1999 it_IT_102.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3081 Jun 15 1999 it_IT_102.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3197 Jun 15 1999 ja_JP_106.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 9707 Jun 15 1999 ja_JP_106.kdef
-rwxrwxr-x 1 root root 63774 Jun 15 1999 kbcvt
-rwxrwxr-x 1 root root 75064 Jun 15 1999 mkkbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3646 Jun 15 1999 nl_NL_102.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3427 Jun 15 1999 nl_NL_102.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3428 Jun 15 1999 no_NO_102.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3279 Jun 15 1999 no_NO_102.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 4186 Jun 15 1999 noaltgr.inc
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 4025 Jun 15 1999 pl_PL_102.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 4216 Jun 15 1999 pl_PL_102.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3377 Jun 15 1999 pt_PT_102.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3146 Jun 15 1999 pt_PT_102.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 2132 Jun 15 1999 ru_RU_102.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 10780 Jun 15 1999 ru_RU_102.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 2429 Jun 15 1999 sample.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 32416 Jun 15 1999 sample.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3397 Jun 15 1999 se_SE_102.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3154 Jun 15 1999 se_SE_102.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 5129 Jun 15 1999 shiftlk.inc
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3813 Jun 15 1999 sk_SK_102.kbd
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 4719 Jun 15 1999 sk_SK_102.kdef
-rw-rw-r-- 1 root root 3611 Jun 15 1999 symbols.inc
$

2

Pim Bollen <pim@vimec.nl> wrote:

What could be the cause that the compose key is not working. We need
this to work for our international customers.
I attached a 104-key keyboard to the qnx system at the PS/2 port and
tried in a pterm the key sequences as indicated in the helpfile. Yet no
sucess > :frowning:

Don’t use pterm to test keyboard mappings. Use a pure Photon
application, like ped.

Pterm performs its own conversion from Unicode to the text-mode
character set. Many characters are simply ignored by this conversion –
the text-mode character set is an 8-bit encoding that can’t represent
all of Unicode. And even if a character does get translated to the
text-mode encoding, it may get thrown away by the shell or whatever
you’re running inside the pterm.

–
Wojtek Lerch QNX Software Systems Ltd.

3

Wojtek Lerch wrote:

Don’t use pterm to test keyboard mappings. Use a pure Photon
application, like ped.

Pterm performs its own conversion from Unicode to the text-mode
character set. Many characters are simply ignored by this conversion –
the text-mode character set is an 8-bit encoding that can’t represent
all of Unicode. And even if a character does get translated to the
text-mode encoding, it may get thrown away by the shell or whatever
you’re running inside the pterm.

This does not make any difference.
When I type followed by ’ followed by a I get just 'a

4

Pim Bollen <pim@vimec.nl> wrote:

Wojtek Lerch wrote:

Don’t use pterm to test keyboard mappings. Use a pure Photon
application, like ped.

This does not make any difference.
When I type followed by ’ followed by a I get just 'a

Ah. Most likely, this means that Input was not able to load the
en_US_101.kbd file and is using a builtin minimal version of the US
mapping, which doesn’t have any compose sequences.

Does your version of Photon have the kbsel utility? Can you try playing
with it to see if it works?

–
Wojtek Lerch QNX Software Systems Ltd.

5

Wojtek Lerch wrote:

Pim Bollen <> pim@vimec.nl> > wrote:

Wojtek Lerch wrote:

Don’t use pterm to test keyboard mappings. Use a pure Photon
application, like ped.


This does not make any difference.
When I type followed by ’ followed by a I get just 'a


Ah. Most likely, this means that Input was not able to load the
en_US_101.kbd file and is using a builtin minimal version of the US
mapping, which doesn’t have any compose sequences.

Does your version of Photon have the kbsel utility? Can you try playing
with it to see if it works?

Now we are coming close…
My version of Photon has kbsel. It looks for .kbd files in
/etc/config/kbd which is empty. My keyboard files are located in
/qnx4/photon/keyboard also reachable via /usr/photon/keyboard
I’ll try playing with kbsel.

6

OK Wojtek,

I copied the .kbd files into /etc/config/kbd and it worked!
Thank you for pushing me into the right direction.
Now I also found the section in the helpfile concerning this item.
Completely read over it.
Thanks

Pim

7

Pim Bollen <pim@vimec.nl> wrote:

I copied the .kbd files into /etc/config/kbd and it worked!

I imagine that if you put the full path in the KBD environment varable
instead, it would have worked, too.

–
Wojtek Lerch QNX Software Systems Ltd.