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05-02-2010, 06:02 PM
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#1
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Member
Registered: Apr 2010
Distribution: Starting with Debian. When I've learn it passably well, moving to Gentoo. Opinions are appreciated!
Posts: 69
Rep:
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How to change the keyboard layout (I have English-Russian set-up, Russian kbd wrong)
I have Debian running in Russian and English.
The Russian keyboard layout isn't the typewriter standard, which I know and much prefer to the one it gives me.
NOTE: I am NOT using KDE or gnome. (ratpoison is my windows manager.) I need to solve this via CLI-based solution, I want it to affect the keyboard I get both in ratpoison and in a basic CLI tty (when I'm not in X).
How do I do that?
Thanks in advance!
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05-02-2010, 09:07 PM
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#2
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Senior Member
Registered: Jul 2003
Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Distribution: Ubuntu Linux 16.04, Debian 10, LineageOS 14.1
Posts: 1,573
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I think "dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg" gives options to change the keyboard setting.
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05-02-2010, 09:09 PM
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#3
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Member
Registered: Apr 2010
Distribution: Starting with Debian. When I've learn it passably well, moving to Gentoo. Opinions are appreciated!
Posts: 69
Original Poster
Rep:
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Presumably not for the non-X tty CLI consoles, though, right?
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05-03-2010, 03:56 AM
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#4
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Member
Registered: Oct 2004
Location: Manchester UK
Distribution: Arch, Fedora
Posts: 54
Rep:
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$ setxkbmap ru
I've not used ratpoison but I don't see from what I've checked on the web that setxkbmap should not work with it.
How you go on when you are not using an X server ... ?
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05-03-2010, 08:01 AM
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#5
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Member
Registered: Apr 2010
Distribution: Starting with Debian. When I've learn it passably well, moving to Gentoo. Opinions are appreciated!
Posts: 69
Original Poster
Rep:
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ratpoison uses the X-server.
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05-03-2010, 08:47 AM
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#6
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Member
Registered: Apr 2010
Distribution: Starting with Debian. When I've learn it passably well, moving to Gentoo. Opinions are appreciated!
Posts: 69
Original Poster
Rep:
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How do I use setxkbmap to set ONE variant of the keyboard layout for ONE of TWO installed languages?
$setxkbmap -ru-cp1251, for example, is accepted, but doesn't appear to change anything.
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05-03-2010, 09:29 AM
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#7
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Member
Registered: Oct 2004
Location: Manchester UK
Distribution: Arch, Fedora
Posts: 54
Rep:
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/usr/share/X11/xkb/rules/xorg.lst
Under:
! layout
...
...
...
...
phonetic ru: Phonetic
phonetic_winkeys ru: Phonetic Winkeys
typewriter ru: Typewriter
legacy ru: Legacy
tt ru: Tatar
os_legacy ru: Ossetian, legacy
os_winkeys ru: Ossetian, Winkeys
cv ru: Chuvash
cv_latin ru: Chuvash Latin
udm ru: Udmurt
kom ru: Komi
sah ru: Yakut
xal ru: Kalmyk
dos ru: DOS
bak ru: Bashkirian
So:
$ setxkbmap ru -variant typewriter
will give the typewriter variant of Russian.
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1 members found this post helpful.
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05-03-2010, 09:51 AM
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#8
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Member
Registered: Oct 2004
Location: Manchester UK
Distribution: Arch, Fedora
Posts: 54
Rep:
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One should perhaps point out that Gnome has an additional keyboard "layer" so that each application can be set to use a different keyboard. It also means that you don't lose things like Ctrl+C, Ctrl+X, Ctrl+V when you change the keyboard to a non-Roman alphabet.
Unless things have changed recently even KDE works directly on the setxkbmap settings.
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05-03-2010, 10:25 AM
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#9
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Member
Registered: Apr 2010
Distribution: Starting with Debian. When I've learn it passably well, moving to Gentoo. Opinions are appreciated!
Posts: 69
Original Poster
Rep:
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Awesome, r-t... partially.
Yes, that changed the keyboard to the layout I wanted... after which I couldn't switch back to English in X and had to reboot.
BUT when I rebooted the computer and restarted X, it was back to where I started.
What I want is to preserve the option to switch between RU and EN, but I want to set the RU keyboard layout PERMANENTLY to 'typewriter'.
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05-03-2010, 10:35 AM
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#10
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Member
Registered: Apr 2010
Distribution: Starting with Debian. When I've learn it passably well, moving to Gentoo. Opinions are appreciated!
Posts: 69
Original Poster
Rep:
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Quote:
Originally Posted by r-t
One should perhaps point out that Gnome has an additional keyboard "layer" so that each application can be set to use a different keyboard. It also means that you don't lose things like Ctrl+C, Ctrl+X, Ctrl+V when you change the keyboard to a non-Roman alphabet.
Unless things have changed recently even KDE works directly on the setxkbmap settings.
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I do want this to work throughout X - especially, of course, in Writer and similar programs.
But, really - everywhere. Ideally, even in the non-X interface.
The most crucial thing, though, is to get it working in X, in word processing.
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05-03-2010, 11:04 AM
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#11
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Member
Registered: Oct 2004
Location: Manchester UK
Distribution: Arch, Fedora
Posts: 54
Rep:
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Well, of course, once you have typed:
$ setxkbmap us
or
$ setxkbmap gb
and
$ setxkbmap ru -variant typewriter
and any others into the command line, you can use the keyboard up-arrow to select which you want.
The other option is to edit xorg.conf (see, for example:
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/OmegaT/message/11593 ) and set it to toggle using specified keys.
But the "smoothest" option as far as I know is to use Gnome and set things up at Keyboard Preferences with a Keyboard Indicator in the desktop tray/panel. (Unless you are talking about Java applications!)
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05-03-2010, 11:14 AM
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#12
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Member
Registered: Apr 2010
Distribution: Starting with Debian. When I've learn it passably well, moving to Gentoo. Opinions are appreciated!
Posts: 69
Original Poster
Rep:
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I set up Debian with the 2 kbds.
I did go into xorg.conf and saw a "variant" section in the section on the RU keyboard. I changed it to "typewriter"... but it doesn't work.
By which I mean that it shifts to the same Russian keyboard layout it had before.
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05-03-2010, 11:27 AM
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#13
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Member
Registered: Oct 2004
Location: Manchester UK
Distribution: Arch, Fedora
Posts: 54
Rep:
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Perhaps you put the variant in brackets as here:
http://www.daemonforums.org/showthread.php?t=1830
My xorg.conf on Fedora however has no keyboard information in it at all – it just seems to be used to set up the nVidia video card.
Last edited by r-t; 05-03-2010 at 11:29 AM.
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05-03-2010, 11:58 AM
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#14
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Member
Registered: Apr 2010
Distribution: Starting with Debian. When I've learn it passably well, moving to Gentoo. Opinions are appreciated!
Posts: 69
Original Poster
Rep:
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OK, largely (but NOT completely) solved!
In xorg.conf, the point isn't to make the "XKBVariant" variable read "typewriter," but to have the "XKBLayout" variable read "us,ru(typewriter)"
It is the addition of "(typewriter)" that did the trick!
BUT one thing is left:
How do I affect/alter the choice of the layout of the Russian keyboard when I hit alt-shift and I'm *NOT* in X? Just in a tty? The choice IS, somehow, being made.
Thanks, all!
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