Greek on linux???
 

Hi all,

well everything is going quite well with my favourite linux box. But I can't write greek in X. I added some *ttf fonts in a directiory, changed both XF86Config & XF86Config-4 but in all apps my only greek are questionmarks...

Any advice would be appreciated...

(I use Debian Woody, v3)

I use Debian unstable, and I use this to read/type Chinese, but hopefully this should work the same for you in stable/greek...

Try an "apt-cache search m17n" - this shows packages related to "multilingualization". Try installing m17n-env and running (as root)"set-m17n-env", then look up the name of the greek locale identifier. Make sure you select it in addition to any other languages / character sets you want, and it will also let you select the default language / character set. Then you can run this same program again as the user, to change that user's settings away from the default (for example, if one of your users primarily uses a language different from the system default).

If when you type greek, you normally have to hit a special key combination (like ctrl+space or something) to be able to type greek letters, then you may need to install / setup SCIM also. Post back if you need this, need help with this, and I will try to help you.

I think you should just use SCIM. Nothing beats it. I use it on SuSE 9.1 for Hebrew and Arabic and it works perfectly, you just click SHIFT SPACE or CTRL SPACE and the recentlanguage pops up. All you need is the right Greek fonts installed. Wherever you type will then be Greek, also in root console. Note that you don't even have to use the mouse. To let the menu show up, type CTRL ALT M, and you can then use the UP or DOWN keys.
They say it works best on SuSE 9.3 but I'm too lazy to upgrade. On 9.1 it works fine too.
Also check the list m17n@suse.com, there's some geniuses out there now and then who help perfect SCIM themselves, who use languages like Japanese, or Chinese all the time.

M17N SCIM and funny characters
 

What I forgot to mention is that SCIM is also the perfect way for people using Latin scripts (=what you read right now I mean) and who need things like ë ö ò é ê û ü etcetera, can also use SCIM. If you install all the right packages, of course, SCIM also has, besides Malayalam, Persian or Russian, the menu "others" > M17N-t-latn-pre (for example,there are others similar). Say you're French, you need é, then ' e will result in é. So everyone just spread the SCIM word! SCIM by the way even has an option to enter th RAW code of Unicode. Those code are a.o. listed in the OpenOffice Special characters menu. So if you need one crazy sign all the time, you can let SCIM handle it. This also solves the complaint that OpenOffice doesn't handle these signs itself.