Re: Some developement questions

[Filipp Gunbin <fgunbin@fastmail.fm>]

On 07/09/2018 23:27 +0200, hw wrote:

> Filipp Gunbin <fgunbin@fastmail.fm> writes:
>
>> On 07/09/2018 09:18 +0200, hw wrote:
>>
>>> Filipp Gunbin <fgunbin@fastmail.fm> writes:
>>>
>>> I've never used a Russian one.  That might make a nice collectors item
>>> :)
>>
>> Believe me, there's really nothing special about it.  We usually switch
>> between English and Cyrillic layout.  All Cyrillic letters are put on
>> the keyboard directly, with no AltGr or anything like that.  If you
>> enable "russian-computer" input method in Emacs, you'll get the same as
>> we have on Russian keyboards.
>
> Well, I don't know how to read these letters while you see them all
> around all the time, so it's not special for you.

You may well not be able to read the letters, but the layout is
structured like the US layout - lowercase and uppercase letters, digits
and some punctuation.  In that sense it is "simpler" than levels of
alterations in German layout (at least to me :-)

>>>> You should have 2 Ctrl's and 2 Alt's (one of which could be AltGr)
>>>> on a German keyboard, so you should be in same situations as other
>>>> users.
>>>
>>> AltGr is not an Alt key.  There is only *one* Alt key on German
>>> keyboards, and it's on the left side.
>> [...]
>>
>> Yes, I see from the article that you have that additional (third) level
>> of alteration, besides normal keys and shifted keys.
>
> We have a few characters for which there are no keys available, so
> someone invented AltGr to make them available.  The result is that
> symbols easy to reach on US keyboards are difficult to reach because the
> keys that are easy to reach carry the additional characters, and the
> symbols are only reachable with AltGr.
>
> That was really stupid; they should just have added a couple more keys
> instead.

Have you tried Emacs input methods I wrote about?  My impression is that
for any non-US script it should be convenient to use input methods.  It
might be the case that I'm wrong and people in Germany don't switch
between layouts, and do everything in default German layout.  But, say,
for Russian that is simply not possible, because the whole keyboard is
taken by Cyrillic alphabet.

Of course we have OS-level switch, but I don't use that in Emacs because
other keys break (but they remain functional with input method turned
on).  I use OS-level layout switch only in other apps.

Filipp